


Gardens Of The Sinner

by MadAndy



Series: Tattoos And Alibis [3]
Category: Edguy, Gamma Ray, Helloween
Genre: F/F, F/M, Gen, M/M, Multi, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-15
Updated: 2016-02-15
Packaged: 2018-05-20 20:03:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 23
Words: 124,435
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6022951
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MadAndy/pseuds/MadAndy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bouncing from the sofa Tobi let out a wild whoop. "You won't regret this, Jens! It's gonna be wild."</p>
<p>"That," said his friend, "is what I'm afraid of."</p>
<p>
  <i>Sequel to No World Order!</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. In The Beginning...

**Author's Note:**

> Written in 2006

_****_

In The Beginning....

The albums were long finished. The touring was done. The summer festival appearances were over.

Time to think and reflect before hitting the studio in the spring. Catch up with family and friends. Attend to all those millions of little jobs that you put off, neglected or quite simply didn’t have time for when you were mid-album, tour, or whatever.

Kai was, in short, bored.

Sitting up in bed, he lit a cigarette and stared into the dark of his bedroom, pondering. Sucked air hissed through the end of the smoke, brightening it to fill the room with red haze then sighing down to a dim glow, his lungs holding the blue-grey toxins deep before releasing them in a curling, twisting fog that reached for the ceiling. The smoke bumped along the painted surface, faded into nothingness as the next billow caught up with it, subsumed the floating vapour into its body before it, too, vanished to sight in the invisible air currents of the room.

There had to be _something._

Maybe something...short. Time wise, that is, he thought as he fidgeted with the quilt, got himself comfortable.

Something ridiculous and fun and Byzantine in its organisation. Something crazy.

He wondered if anybody else was as bored as him.

Kai grinned, picked up the phone, and dialled a number that had once been as familiar to him as the back of his own hand.

~*~

Rain dripped through the holes in the roof, landed with a mournful echo in the scattered puddles on the cracked, pitted concrete floor of the abandoned warehouse. Autumn winds rattled the doors, rotting in surrounds themselves turning to a rusty sludge with the desolation of the years.

A cold wind forced its way through the cracks in the walls, and hissed across the empty space. The figure bundled up in a thick wooly scarf under their leather jacket shivered, cocked a blue eye at the cat’s paw ripples across the closest large puddle. The edges were still limned with ice from this morning’s frost, and with no sunshine to melt it it remained, the ripples breaking themselves to nothing along the sharp, splintered margins.

“I’m not telling you anything,” said the man, curled into a little heap of misery and bruises on the wet, cold concrete.

The short figure glared at him and scowled.

“Let me go, bitch,” snarled the man on the floor, rolling back and forth in his efforts to escape.

Yoz sighed, shuffled over a little to avoid the squirming bundle. She eyed him, mismatched blue and brown eyes about all that was showing between thick scarf and wooly hat pulled down over her brow. Yanking the scarf down revealed a small, cold-reddened nose and full pale lips, between which she screwed a cigarette butt and - with much jiggling of her lighter in leather gloved fingers - lit it, then huffed a stream of ghost white smoke across the frigid space between them.

“Look. Business is slow, right? And you must have annoyed the wrong people. I was paid to find you and bring you here, so I found you and--”

“I'm going to kill you.”

“Of course you are, mate. _Course_ you are.”

The tone made the guy pause. She didn't sound as though she was speaking with the sort of false bravado he was so used to hearing; no, it had been more amused than anything else. Didn't she know who he was?

“If I didn't know who you were I wouldn't have found you so easy, would I?”

He went back to cursing and wriggling, and she sidestepped again. This was not, truth be told, the sort of job she liked to take, easy as it was. Simple find-and-retrieve; there were always bad people in the city willing to pay someone to do a chunk of their dirty work for them. And as long as they stuck to tearing each other into tiny little pieces and not handfuls of more-or-less innocent bystanders then yeah, fine. She'd take the contract. 

On the whole she tried not to take the straight assassination jobs these days, though.

Still. The word was that if you wanted someone found in a hurry Yoz was your man - so to speak - and when there wasn't anything else going on in the magical, supernatural or just plain weird arenas then she'd put the word out that she was looking for work. It didn't take long to come in, and the payoff from a couple of these nasty little contracts would keep her going for a while.

Didn't mean she had to enjoy it, though.

The guy on the floor was spitting fury now, thrashing in his restraints as he tried to get away. She sighed, watched him with eyes as cold as the wind that whistled along the gritty concrete. He knew who was coming for him, and he was afraid - she could read that written across the front of his mind in big red letters. Of neon. Underlined.

“Look, I've got money--”

She shrugged. “Not enough to repair my reputation.”

“Drugs! Girls!”

A rude snort echoed up to the rafters. “You _have_ noticed what sex I am? Good.”

“Anything - let me go, for pity's sake. They're gonna kill me!”

Another shrug, followed by a plume of smoke from a freshly lit cigarette.

“Not my problem, squire. And at least you can stop worrying about it now--” she crouched next to his head, tangled gloved fngers in his hair and yanked his head up so that he could see the four large men that had just forced their way through the rotting door, “--because they're here.”

She dropped him, rose to go and meet the new arrivals. They didn't speak; the leading figure passed her an envelope, which she squirreled away in an inside pocket. One of the others - an individual whose neck seemed to have vanished into his muscular shoulders - shot her a dirty look, which she returned with a raised eyebrow.

Walking past them, she caught the man's elbow. He went to shrug her off, but his face paled when he discovered that he couldn't; the leading figure snorted, shook his head. He'd warned his associates to take the small, odd looking woman seriously - but as ever, one of the youngsters hadn't listened. He'd seen it all before, and headed for the bound man secure in the knowledge that his muscle would rejoin them shortly, older and wiser and - in all probability - fairly bruised.

The man tried to shake Yoz off, but she just bared her teeth at him and dug her fingers in. He growled, turned toward her and raised his other fist; she hissed, twisted her fingers and with a snort threw him on his back away from her. He slid, rolled to a halt in one of the ice-rimed puddles, surged to his feet and headed toward her again with a face as black as thunder and murder in his glare.

She sucked on her cigarette and rolled her eyes. _There's always one_ , she thought as his round shouldered charge brought him ever closer.

Stuffing her hands in her pockets she scowled at him; to his astonishment the very expression threw him to his knees, held him there with his hands clenched at his sides, breath exploding from him in great, silvery gouts while he fought the invisible bonds that nailed him to the spot.

Yoz leaned in to him, lips close enough to his ear that he could feel the whisper of her breath warm across his cheek. 

“You know, in your business I would have thought you would have learned how unwise it is to judge a book by its cover,” she murmured, then stood back from him with a wink.

A sharp word from the boss stopped any response the hulking young man might have made, and he struggled to his feet to join his comrades without another look at the smirking Magus. Shaking her head, she pulled her scarf back up over her nose, pulled her woolly hat further down over her ears, and turned to leave.

Behind her, the screaming started.

She didn't look back.

~*~

“It can't be done at such short notice, Kai.”

“Yes! Yes it can! In fact, I've already had management check it out, and it turns out that--”

Mike listened to Kai's excited chatter, and sighed. Booking a mini tour at such short notice? Publicity and tickets and organisation and all the rigamarole that went with taking a band on the road? According to the exuberant voice on the other end of the phone, all taken care of. All he - they, Gamma Ray in general and Kai in particular - needed was a couple of bands to join in the fun. His words.

“It's been a long year, Kai,” sighed Mike, juggling his cigarette and the handset as he reached for his coffee. “We're tired. I mean, Andi won't--”

“I've already spoken to him. He says if you agree he's up for it.”

There was a long silence.

“You've already spoken to Andi.”

“Well...yes.”

“Kai!”

Kai at least had the good grace to sound ashamed. “Well, I knew you'd say that Andi was tired, so I thought I'd--”

“Kai.”

“--check with him first and then--”

“Kai.”

“--oh come on Mike it'll be--”

“ _Kai!_ ”

Weiki’s yell stopped Kai dead in his tracks, and he pinched the bridge of his nose with a long suffering sigh.

“So Andi said he'd do it?”

“Well...yeah.”

“And I know,” mused Mike thoughtfully, considering the late summer dryness through his apartment window, “that Sascha's side project fell through, and Dani's girlfriend dumped him so they're both miserable and bored--”

“And Markus is always happy to come out and play.”

Kai's voice sounded contrite, and Mike snorted at him. “Let me check a few things out, OK?”

“OK!”

Exuberance restored, Kai sounded so happy that Weiki had to laugh at him. It was hard to stay mad at him for long.

“So who else have you got lined up for this insane scheme...?”

~*~

Yoz stomped along the road, head down, lost in thought. She rather hoped that somebody would try and mug her; beating the shit out of someone who royally deserved it would improve her mood no end.

Since the end of the war between the Illuminati and Rosicrucians things had been...quiet. It was as though every creature of magic, every Magus, every purveyor of the weird, the wonderful, the terrifying and the otherwordly had gone to ground, the supernatural ether barely stirred even by the normal psychic currents of life. Even the feeders on men's souls were keeping their heads down, it seemed; she hadn't had a good exorcism - indeed, any exorcism at all - for weeks. Months, even.

Thin times for a jobbing Magus such as herself, hence the need to take such mundane jobs as hunting down bad men for other bad men to play with.

Screams still rang in her mind, and she hunched her shoulders up round her ears and walked on.

Leaves whirled around her feet as she stomped along the pavement, some still green; the autumn storms had come early, tearing foliage not yet dead from the grubby branches of the city's trees. A thin, cold wind nipped and pulled at her, tried to work its way under her jacket and scarf with its unseasonable chill.

Mind on nothing more than reaching her favourite all night caff - where she could guarantee a big mug of tea and a fry up - she paused mid stride, one foot still off the ground.

Something was...moving.

Someone was fiddling with reality, moulding its shape to better suit them.

Grinning behind the scarf, she leaned against the nearest wall and unfocused her eyes, took a quick scan of the surrounding area. Not too close, but strong; whoever was doing this was quite clumsy, but had to have at least a modicum of skill to be able to perform such a powerful magic.

Shrugging away from the chill of the damp brickwork, Yoz set off with a renewed spring in her step. Once she'd had something to eat she'd head back to the squat, do some rummaging, see what was up. And if it concerned her, or was something she could conceivably go and poke about with, or even might be something she should leave alone, unlikely as that was. She'd netted enough from these last couple of jobs to keep her going for a while - so maybe it was time to go and play in somebody else's sandpit for a while.

Might even be fun.

Whistling under her breath she carried on toward her destination, now anticipating that nice hot mug of tea even more.

~*~

“He wants to do _what?_ ”

Tobias laughed, flopped back on his sofa and grinned with affection at the phone and the connection to his friend and guitarist. “Oh come on, Jens. It'll be fun!”

“But weren't we due to go back in the--?”

“We can go in the studio after we finish. It won't delay things by much.”

Jens sighed. “Tobi, how is it going to be possible to get the venues, the tickets, the promotion--”

“Kai said it's all sorted out! Come on, do you want to do it or not?”

“Well...what do the others say?”

Tobi sat forward, his eyes bright with enthusiasm. “Eggi and Felix were supposed to be doing that side project of theirs - but it's fallen through. Their singer's ill, or something. Dirk's keen, so you were the last one. Come on, Jens, it'll be fun!”

Another deep, wrenching sigh - and Tobi knew he'd won. Three bands, one short, whistle stop tour - just because they could. No rest, as they said, for the wicked. And with a chance like this, Tobi was feeling very wicked indeed.

“So I can tell him yes?”

“Just tell me when and where, Tobi, and I'll be there. When do we start rehearsing?”

Bouncing from the sofa Tobi let out a wild whoop. “You won't regret this, Jens! It's gonna be wild.”

“That,” said his friend, “is what I'm afraid of.”

__

~tbc~


	2. One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Off duty police do not like to see things which mean that they have to become on duty police, and so even the slightest hint of trouble was met with a wall of large, burly individuals who would very politely and calmly escort you next door and leave you with the duty officer on a charge of Being A Bloody Nuisance.

_****_

Chapter One

Late summer sunshine had warmed the roof slates to a comfortable level of toasty, and now it had gone down they felt delightfully warm and alive under his toes.

Bounding along from roof to roof, relaxing into the feel of muscle stretch and the spring of tendon, taking in the heady scents of the city's nighttime life as it woke up, stretching and uncurling with a yawn to see what this period of darkness would bring. He felt alive, and the warmth of the roofs under his feet just made the sensation all the stronger, making the city feel like one huge organism across whose back he ran.

Anyone that caught a glimpse of him as he bounced along his way would have thought they’d seen a large cat, or maybe a bird; it was the nature of his Beast to hide well, to flow from shadow to shadow and leave the mundane eye wandering in his wake. Of the very, very small number of city dwellers who ever bothered to look up - and of the even smaller number who did so as he passed - almost none would wonder at his shape skipping along the tiles, eyes bright and ears a-twitch to receive the news from _his_ world.

Powerful hind legs propelled him out across a gap between buildings, heavy, naked tail swung to steer him straight, agile paws grasped rungs and balanced him in his routine patrol of his territory. He’d dropped into a state of mind that was close to the entirely instinctual, allowing his Beast to process the information rushing at him from all his senses at once.

Which is how he missed the trap.

~*~

Kai was deep in discussion with Henjo, working through the labyrinth of things that had to be arranged before the tour - however short - could hit the road. Who had to be called, which stage set to use, equipment, transport, staff--

Dirk found himself a seat and stared at the control board, eyes far away with the discomfort of his thoughts. 

It took Henjo a couple of tries to get his attention, and when he came back from where his wonderings had taken him he found both his friends staring at him.

“What?”

“You were very far away,” said Kai with a smile.

Dirk shrugged, and leaned forward to pick at something stuck to the edge of the mixing desk. He flicked his nail at it a few times, deliberately tuning both the other men out; he’d come here to talk, but now...now he found he really didn’t want to share what had been on his mind.

A nudge in his side drew his attention back, and he looked straight into Henjo’s concerned expression.

“What is it?”

He lifted one shoulder in a half-shrug, and felt horribly uncomfortable. “Don’t you think all of this,” and he waved a hand over the paperwork the pair of them had been poring over, “is a bit convenient? I’ve never heard of an event like this being organised at such short notice.”

“That,” Kai told him with a smile, “is because nobody’s tried it before. Add a dash of Hansen charm, and--”

“You think it’s not right?” asked Henjo.

Dirk looked away. “Maybe,” he said.

“Dirk--”

“After everything that’s happened to us? All the arguing with the record company? Being suspected of,” and he swallowed hard, “of murder? And all of a sudden they’re willing to throw money at us for a short series of gigs that are going to be very, very lucky if they break even, let alone make any profit. And everyone else being available - just by chance. All those side projects falling through. How likely is that?”

Kai and Henjo stared at him, a nasty little creep of suspicion worming its way into their minds at his words. He was right, they couldn’t deny him that. No matter how much they wanted to just brush his misgivings away, they couldn’t.

“I wish,” he said softly, “that Yoz was here. She could tell us.”

“So that’s it?” grumbled Kai. “You’re missing your Magus. Jesus, Dirk. We can move without her permission, you know.”

“I know that,” snapped Dirk.

“Guys,” sighed Henjo, trying to calm the tension he could feel beginning to snap and crackle in the air like lightning.

“Just because you’re sweet on her--”

“I am not! And if you thought about this for a moment you’d see--”

“Dirk, stop it. Are you with us on this? Will you play?”

There was a very long silence, and eventually Dirk dropped his gaze and nodded. “Yeah. Course.”

“Then that’s settled.”

Kai turned his back on him, and began to pore over the papers again. Dirk opened his mouth to argue, but Henjo caught his eye and gave his head a little shake; best to let Kai stew on this for a while. Carrying on now would just lead to further fights.

He rose, paused in the doorway to look back at the two men. “Just think about it, is all I ask,” he said, then let the door drop softly shut behind him.

Kai snorted, but other than that ignored his departure. Henjo stared at Kai’s bowed head for a moment, then sighed and returned to studying the schedule. Kai might not think about it, but he was going to.

He also wished he could talk to Yoz about it, but rather gloomily concluded that they were going to have to do this one on their own. After all, there was nothing even remotely supernatural about the situation--

Was there?

~*~

Yoz shouldered her way through the narrow alley that led to one of her favourite little bolt holes, somewhere she could almost guarantee she’d be safe, where nobody would dare to come challenge, bother, or try to kill her. There was nothing sorcerous about the place, unless you counted the mundane bewitchment that turned dried leaves and bovine lactation into the finest mug of tea brewed this side of China. And their fry ups were...legendary.

To the chosen few, of course; the owner of this palace of gustatory delight had enough business to keep him comfortably, and had no need to attract new custom. The regulars didn’t want to be crowded by a lot of newcomers, and so it was a secret held close to the cholesterol-clogged hearts of those that ate there.

Of course, the fact that it was right outside one of London’s largest police stations and therefore was filled - day and night - with off duty coppers meant that it was also one of the most trouble-free places to eat in the entire metropolis. Yoz liked it; with just the very tiniest blurring of her face and form she was pretty much guaranteed a little peace and quiet in which to eat. Off duty police do not like to see things which mean that they have to become _on_ duty police, and so even the slightest hint of trouble was met with a wall of large, burly individuals who would very politely and calmly escort you next door and leave you with the duty officer on a charge of Being A Bloody Nuisance.

So when the hairs on the back of her neck began the familiar prickle that meant trouble she didn’t worry overmuch; whoever wanted her could just wait until she’d finished the very fine heart-attack-on-a-plate and tea so strong the tannin stained it orange. The world wasn’t about to end - she’d have noticed - and anything short of such a dire emergency took a very poor second place to a decent breakfast.

And more tea, of course.

Pushing her plate back she sighed, relaxed into the shiny vinyl of the booth seat and lit a cigarette, puffed a plume of pale smoke toward the extractor fan that struggled against a layer of grease in the ceiling. Never mind fancy new rules, a lot of coppers smoked - and they’d be damned if they were going without this particular vice in one of their favourite places to relax. The only concessions to the anti-smoking clientele were the fact that the smoking section was furthest away from doors and windows, buried far to the back of the long, narrow building, and a series of large fans that wheezed away in the ancient polystyrene tiles that made up the low ceiling.

Someone slid into her booth, and pushed a mug of tea across the burn-scarred tabletop toward her. She cocked an eyebrow, puffed on her cig, and waited. The new arrival exuded an air of agitation that had already got him noticed; he was being surreptitiously eyed, and one wrong move would result in a swift ejection from the premises - with a boot up the backside for good measure.

His voice was a whisper, breath faint amongst the chatter. “Magus.”

“That’s me.”

“I need your help,” he muttered, keeping his head down. Yoz watched him for a second, then leaned forward. Propping her chin on the heel of the hand that held her cigarette she waited some more; he was afraid, uncomfortable. If she waited him out he would undoubtedly tell her more than he intended - although if he ended up causing a scene and getting her barred from her favourite little watering hole he was going to find himself in a whole world of trouble.

They sat in silence for a little while, she smoking and watching, he shaking.

“We’re being killed,” he whispered, and her eyebrows shot up. Not the sort of thing you wanted to announce surrounded by a load of coppers; equally, there had been nothing in the more mundane news about any mass murders, so that meant it was probably more her side of the fence than that of the boys currently out of blue that surrounded them.

The man looked up, and in the soft brown eyes she could read pain. He looked younger than his aura would suggest, and if she hadn’t figured out exactly what he was the spike of unease that powered across the table between them at least gave her the general flavour. 

Not human. Not vampire, not anything truly made of magic, legend, or anything other than standard blood and bone; shapeshifter, then.

Unlikely to be bear or wolf - not here in London, although there was a small wolf pack somewhere out Essex way. Not one of the cats, either - they preferred their territories to be more wooded and less urban, on the whole. The aura was more... omnivorous than any of the pure hunting breeds.

So. Pig, or rat.

“Curly tail or long?” she asked, and lit another cigarette.

The youngster curled his lip in a half smile in spite of himself. “Long,” he said.

Rat, then. 

“Sounds interesting,” she said, still eyeing the man with some skepticism. His expression became hopeful, and he stared into her cool regard with some fervour; what he saw in the mismatched gaze appeared to discomfit him, because he soon dropped his stare back to the pattern of oblong cig burns on the table top. One blue and one brown eye considered him carefully through an unkempt black fringe; she reached out a tendril of awareness and stroked it across the surface of his mind. Whatever he hadn’t hidden would be there, sitting at the top, easy to access.

“Well now,” she murmured, and grinned around the dog end gripped between her teeth. “I think we ought to go somewhere and talk, don’t you?”

Without waiting for an answer she downed the last of the tea in her mug, and rose to depart - leaving a generous tip, as she always did. It paid to stay on the good side of those who fed and guarded her so well, if all unknowingly.

The shapeshifter scrambled after her, catching up only once she was striding away down the chilly pavement. He had to trot to keep up with her; only a little taller than she, he still had to hurry in order not to be left behind. Trailing smoke like a steam train she began to talk, questioning him on the situation even as they made their way deeper into the alleys and back streets of this part of the city, as safe as anyone from the all too human predators that so often stalked these places at this small hour of the night.

It had started with the vampires, and at this point she’d snorted a great cloud of frozen breath and smoke to indicate just how much she cared that _they_ were getting wiped out.

But it hadn’t stopped there. And it wasn’t wholesale slaughter, not yet. Whoever was at the heart of the killings would move into a city, wipe out the top individuals of whatever species or clan they’d fixated upon, then move on. While internal strife - politics being rather more bloody amongst the non-human tribes - tore into the survivors. Another city, another species, and so on; and once a city had settled down with a new structure then bang, they’d be back. And the whole cycle would begin over again.

“And you have no idea who’s doing it?”

“None.”

“What, at all? I thought you lot were legendary trackers and hunters and all that shit.”

The young man swore under his breath. “That’s sort of our point. Whoever’s behind this knows how to move, how to hide, how to stay so far out on the fringes of every type of society that we’re missing them completely. It’s nothing that we’ve ever encountered before - it’s like we’re being hunted by a ghost!”

Yoz stopped, turning to cock her head at the shapeshifter, now so agitated he was hopping from foot to foot and baring his teeth, his essential nature beginning to show in his movements. Something he’d said was tickling at her mind, a memory that nagged from its burial somewhere deep. 

_...how to stay so far out on the fringes of every type of society..._

Niggle, niggle. It would come to her, no doubt.

“And if I say I’ll help?”

He grinned for a moment, a flash of sharp teeth. “I can’t discuss terms. If you’re willing I can take you to parley with the King--”

“King rat?”

“Why not?” he laughed. “Oh, come on. You’re not surprised, surely? Anyway, it’s an honorary title - he’s our King, nobody else’s.”

“All right. When?”

“Tomorrow. Midnight. Waterloo station.”

“Why is it always midnight? One day someone’s going to suggest a meeting mid afternoon. Or seven in the morning. Always midnight, bunch of fucking drama queens.”

The shapeshifter laughed at her and bowed. “I’ll meet you there and take you to meet the others. I can guarantee your safety while you parley - and you know we honour our word.”

“Well, yeah. What’s your name, kid?”

“Tod. But everyone calls me--”

“Sweeney, yeah. Jesus.”

They both turned as a new voice interrupted them. Heavy and dark, it belonged to a hulking great youth, shaven headed and broken of tooth, accompanied by two smaller individuals and carrying a knife. A big one.

“Give us your wallets and we’ll let you live.”

Yoz grinned, and turned to her companion.

“As a gesture of good faith, how about you and I take down this ignorant blip together?”

“You two?” snorted the would-be mugger even as Sweeney nodded, eyes bright with anticipation. “Yeah, right--”

Whatever words he’d planned to use next jammed in his throat as the skinny kid with the woman began to change. Flinging his jacket off and undoing his jeans even as his flesh ran and flowed like wax the woman chuckled, told the twisting horror how economical such a move was--

“Practice,” came the words, squeezed through a throat becoming more muscular and furry, fluctuating with the changed structures through which the air was forced, “hate running around naked - ah - after.”

“Fair enough. You take the big one, right?”

The creature beside her dropped into a crouch, bared long, yellow chisel-like teeth, swept grey whiskers back along its cheeks as it snarled. Its heavy, naked tail lashed behind it, the scaly surface flashing dull reflected streetlight back at the stunned attackers; claws grated against the tarmac as the enormous rat coiled himself to spring, and the expressions of the youths facing them dropped even further into astonished, disbelieving terror.

“Pleasure,” it said, and pounced.

Turning to run, the two remaining lads found their exit blocked by the woman they’d discounted as unimportant; only now that she was right in their faces did they begin to realise their mistake. Her eyes gleamed, the blue flashing heat even as the deep brown sucked at their attention with a chill that made their already terrified souls shrink a little further. 

“Now, where d’you think you’re going, boys?”

One broke left, the other - a small, pale eyed individual with a suspicious dark patch on the front of his jeans - froze in place, lips skinned back from his teeth in sheer terror. Yoz flicked a hand at the escapee, lifted him from his feet and sent him headlong into the nearest brick wall.

He landed with a crunch, curled up on the floor and was still.

“Please...” breathed the other one, eyes beginning to fill, “please. Don’t hurt me.”

Yoz snorted. “Oh, right. And if I’d said the same thing? What would you have done? On your knees if you’re going to beg, lad.”

He didn’t hesitate, both knees hitting the asphalt with a crash. Yoz lit a cigarette, flicked a glance across at the rat; he was tearing at the big youth’s shirt with his teeth, muzzle already bloody. She snorted, folded her arms and faced the gibbering wreck in front of her.

“You’re scum. A piece of shit. You prey on the helpless and the weak and...the elderly? Oh, you’re a piece of work, you are. Big brave fucking soldier. I can read your mind, kid - what there is of it - and tell me. Give me one good reason to let you live?”

The boy said nothing, just babbled under his breath.

“Eloquent,” she growled, and made a great show of clasping her hand around an invisible throat in front of her. The boy’s eyes went wide, and he gurgled at her; she lifted him, and his hands came up to clench on the invisible fingers around his throat. The rat laughed, behind her; a peculiarly wet crunch followed the noise, and the writhing youth couldn’t help but glance across at where the noise was coming from. 

What he saw broke the dam; he messed himself, then passed out. Yoz snorted, and tossed the unconscious figure aside. Both of hers would live, although they would carry the physical and mental scars of their tangle with the Magus for whatever remained of their lives. She ambled across to where Sweeney was making a far more thorough job of the ringleader, stepped aside to let a clot of flesh fly past her to land with a wet splat on the wall.

It stuck for a moment, then slid down to the floor where it quivered to a halt.

“Playing with your food, mate?”

He turned to glare at her over his shoulder with a snarl, hackles bristling upright; it took a moment for his senses to recognise her, and when he did he turned back to his prey with a low growl. He plunged his sharp pointed nose back into the carcase; it had ceased to resemble the man that menaced them some time ago, and had been spread across several metres of road to allow the rat to select his meal with more accuracy. Yoz winced at the tearing noise when he lifted his head, teeth slicing out a fresh chunk of something...tasty, she assumed.

“Haven’t had a decent meal for weeks,” he mumbled through a mouthful of something purple and dripping, “and when your two wake up and see this--”

“Yeah. They’re going to piss themselves. Again. I’ll leave you to it, then?”

He nodded, concentrated on his meal once more. Shaking her head the Magus took her leave; it was one of the few things that made her uncomfortable around London’s large population of were-rats, this habit of eating their kills. If they were a little more careful then perhaps they wouldn’t be so hunted--

“Who are you trying to kid,” she sighed, shoved her hands deep into her pockets and looked up at the sky. A gibbous moon was playing tag with the fleeting clouds, almost hidden by the glare of the streetlights; once again she hunched against the cold, and headed for the place she was currently calling home.

~*~

A visitor at this time of night was unusual. Tobi was startled to see Felix on the doorstep, long face far more mournful than usual; he should have been at home, a couple of hours drive away - not standing here looking as though someone had drowned his kitten. He cocked his head, stared up into his friend’s eyes; Felix looked away, pointedly not saying anything until Tobi sighed, stepped back, and waved him in.

“Didn’t think I’d be seeing you tonight,” called Tobi, looking out of his front door at the darkened sky. The moon - just the barest hair’s breadth away from being full - looked back, silver light dimmed by the clouds that scattered throughout the autumn sky.

Felix was in the kitchen, rummaging through the fridge to find a beer. Tobi leaned on the counter, waited for the other man to get to a point where he felt he could talk.

“Help yourself, man. I mean, it’s not like we’re strangers or anything--”

Raising his beer in salute, Felix took a long draught before releasing a long, heartfelt sigh. He leaned on the opposite counter, and the two men looked at each other for a minute before Tobi laughed, cocked his eyebrows in query.

“So, what’s up? If you were coming over for tomorrow I wouldn’t expect to see you until midday. To what do I owe the honour?”

“Tomorrow,” said Felix with another of those mournful exhalations, “we wouldn’t be able to talk, would we?”

“Well, no. Because if you were here tomorrow night then _talking_ would be the last thing on our minds - so I guess that means you want to talk, right?”

“Yeah.”

“What about?”

Felix stared over Tobi’s shoulder and fidgeted. 

“Well? I mean, you’ve come all this way and say you want to talk so--”

“If you’d _shut the fuck up_ for five seconds maybe I could.”

“Oh. Sorry.”

They listened to the hum of the strip lights in the kitchen for a moment. Tobi opened his mouth again, drew in a breath; Felix held up a hand and closed his eyes. “No, Tobi. Look,” and he set his empty bottle down on the counter with a clink. “This tour. You really think it’s a good idea?”

Whatever Tobi had been expecting him to say, it wasn’t this. The tour? It wasn’t due to start for another two months. They still had rehearsals and shit to do, had to organise stage sets and crew and--

“Well, yeah.” He snorted with laughter. “Of course I think it’s a good idea! Jesus, Felix. Think of the exposure! We’ll be doing a dozen shows with the two _biggest_ bands in Power metal! I mean, fuck, these guys started it all, right? And their fans are as crazy as ours. So it’ll be fun, and it’ll be--”

“Tobi!”

“What?”

“Don’t you think it’s a _little_ bit odd that everything came together so fast? That it just so happened that all three bands were free, and management were prepared to pay for such a short tour? And all the venues were free? Well?”

“I think...sometimes things have to go right. Even for us.”

“Tobias.”

“ _What?_ ”

Felix tried to think of an appropriate counter argument, and gave up. Arguing with Tobi was like banging your head against a brick wall - you didn’t get anywhere, and after a while it made your brain hurt. He decided to flip to the other thing he’d wanted to talk to him about tonight - and hope that at least the second topic got him thinking for more than a nanosecond or two as to whether this project was a good idea.

“Look. We’ve been on tour for nine months, right?”

Tobi shrugged. “Yeah. So?”

“So we’ve had to hold it in, hide it. For _nine fucking months_ , Tobi. It’s beginning to hurt, you know that! And we have, what, two months, and then we’ll have to hold it in again? Jesus. It’s painful, you know?”

His friend rubbed at the tiled floor with the toe of one trainer. This was true; having to subsume one’s essential nature - to control it so tightly that never a hint slipped out to alarm the unwary - was hard. And toward the end of the tour it had become almost unbearable; and here he was, attempting to put the pair of them through that self-same torture all over again.

“But you were going to work with--”

Felix bared his teeth for a moment, then subsided and shook his head. “You know why I work with them. They’re the same as us--”

“Except Eggi.”

“Except Eggi. He’s got an idea, but he doesn’t really know,” Felix went back to the fridge, removed another two bottles and passed one to Tobi, “no, he doesn’t get it. But that’s my point. It’s all so terribly convenient...except it’s not. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

“No, I don’t. I see that we’ve got a chance to bring our music to more people than ever before and you’re not happy about it!”

He gave in. He’d known that his trip would likely end in failure, but had to try anyway; something about the whole thing just seemed... _off_...to him, somehow. He got an uneasy feeling about it that put the hair on the back of his neck up, and he cursed himself for not having the words to persuade Tobi of the seriousness of the situation. Still. He had all night--

“So,” and the other man interrupted his thoughts, “are you staying tonight?”

Felix shrugged. “If it’s OK?”

“Sure.” And now Tobi grinned, raising his bottle in salute. “And tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow.”

And Tobi was off again, talking nineteen to the dozen, eyes all sparkling over the marvellous plans he had for the short tour they’d be undertaking. Felix followed him through to the lounge, dropped onto a sofa and nodded, keeping the bare minimum of agreement going to make Tobi think he was actually paying attention.

It was going to be a very long night.

__

~~tbc~~


	3. Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Two puzzles. And according to the First Law Of Yoz (somebody's always out to get you), events like this were rarely coincidental.

_****_

Chapter Two

Yoz paced.

After such a busy night she should be sleeping, resting up for whatever the following one would bring, but she couldn’t. Her mind wouldn’t shut down, whirring and pulling and nibbling at everything she’d seen and heard and done tonight. It didn’t quite add up, and that bothered her. 

Plus she had the strangest feeling--

She went to the window, pushed aside the rag that served as a curtain, and used the side of her hand to sweep a little of the dust and grime from the pane. Staring out over the quiescent city she chewed on her lip, wheels within wheels turning as she thought hard about what she’d felt earlier that night. There was no earthly reason to think that the two were connected, but... but but but.

Someone was killing off various non humans. And being very clever about it, too; your average Magus - or religious nut - would be found out in double quick time, and find their monster-hunting career cut very short indeed. No, this was something entirely different. And unlikely to be an inside job; one tribe might pick a fight with another, but the pattern of these killings was far too... _human_ for that. 

And someone was fiddling with reality. Was there any evidence that these two were the same person, or had the same agenda? No. 

Even so.

Reality was very, very strong. It had a weight and a direction - a mass, if you would - all of its own. Changing it was possible; she’d done it herself a time or two, when the situation demanded it. But it was very hard, and it required a massive amount of power, not to mention buckets of determination and sheer bloody mindedness. But a quick scan didn’t indicate that anything significant had changed - so what had been touched? Why?

Two puzzles. And according to the First Law Of Yoz (somebody’s always out to get you), events like this were rarely coincidental. Find the answer to one, find the answer to the other; unearth the link and you were more than halfway there.

Which meant only one thing. She was going to have to go Outside and look - never mind that she was tired and a little irritable, and really could do with a few hours rest before she had to face representatives from all of London’s many and varied packs of ‘shifters.

Swearing under her breath, she let the curtain drop and went to make ready.

~*~

Mike eyed Andi across the table, and drew on his cigarette. So he’d told Kai he was fresh and rested, had he? Raring to go and willing to strike out on a mad venture like this insane mini-tour?

So why did he look like shit, then?

The best way to find out, he decided, was to ask; he and Andi had known each other for long enough that Weiki could smell a rat if Andi tried to get anything past him. 

“You look tired.”

Andi smiled through his fringe, reached out across the table to grind out his own smoke into the ashtray that Weiki had commandeered. “I suppose I do.”

“Are you going to be rested by the time we go out on the road again? Well. I should say, are you going to be rested by the time we need to start organising and rehearsing and hiring crew and - oh, wait. That would be...tomorrow would be a good time to start, don’t you think?”

His friend snorted, lit a fresh cigarette and leaned back in his chair, stared over the balcony at the vista of red-tiled roofs that stretched away toward the sea. Dark circles smudged the delicate skin beneath his eyes; each tour got harder and harder for him to cope with, took a heavier toll on his physical and mental health. He gave everything he had, every time, and Mike wondered - as did they all - if the day was coming when he couldn’t do it any more.

Andi sighed. “I know. You think it’s crazy that I agreed to do this tour, aren’t you?”

Weiki gave a short bark of laughter. “How’d you guess?”

“The glare, the grumbling, the pointed questions - I’m right, aren’t I? Can’t hide anything from me, you old fraud.”

His friend shuffled about on his own chair, wagged one long finger. “I a fraud? Of course! Because I’m the one telling Kai that I’m well and fresh and ready to tour when, actually, I’m still exhausted from the last one. Because that would be fraudulent, don’t you think?”

Closing his eyes, Andi let out a long breath through his nose. “Weiki--”

“Don’t ‘Weiki’ me in that tone of voice, Deris. We’re supposed to be hitting the studio in the new year - and for that we need you rested and ready to work. Not with your voice still shredded from touring!”

He couldn’t say he was entirely surprised when Andi turned on him, bright blue eyes snapping with anger. 

“Are you saying I can’t do it? Accusing me of deliberately destroying my voice - and my health, Weiki, we’re talking about that too - so that we won’t be able to record?”

“I’m not saying--”

“Yes, you are. You think I can’t do it, don’t you?”

“It’s not that I think you can’t, but is it wise to--”

“Dammit, Weiki!”

The other man subsided with a grumble, ran the pads of his long fingers in a circle on the table, avoided meeting Andi’s eyes. Whatever his friend said, he really didn’t think it was a good idea - but they’d said they would go, so that was all there was to it. They would do it.

But it still seemed off, to him.

~*~

Yoz spun through the void between Universes, and stretched her mind across the glorious emptiness with a happy little sigh. Felt good to be Out Here once more; this was where her skills were firing on all cylinders, her mind and magic welded into a sharp unit that dived through the impossibilities of space and time like a salmon through choppy water. Satisfaction allied with the extreme wariness of one who could be, at the same time, predator and prey; there were Things out here that could destroy her mind in a flash, drive her to madness and beyond without even trying.

But they’d have to catch her first.

 _To work_ , she thought, and narrowed her focus to the glittering ball of glowing chaos that was her home Universe. Sliding above it, running the whipping tendrils of her awareness through the ether she soon found the places where someone had been all a-fiddle with the very nature of reality itself. There was just one problem, though: none of it seemed to make any sense.

A cat that should have been run over and killed made it across a busy road safely. A man that washed his hands after using the toilet didn’t. A tree that fell in the path of a car collapsed on the verge. An electrical burnout not discovered for a few hours. A heated discussion between lovers that ended in greater understanding now became tears before bedtime; tiny things, none of them significant in themselves, such small every day events in the smooth running of the daily life of the planet. And yet somebody had changed them.

Following the threads of consequence, the causal strings that led from one event to another in time - and comparing them with the ghostly whispers of what _should_ have been, what _would_ have been - gave her some hints for the why. 

_Clever_ , she thought, gaining a grudging admiration for the deviousness of the plan. Any other Magus would have missed it totally; you had to follow the shifting lines of cause and effect a long way from each changed event to discover the one thing that the person had actually been aiming for. Some of the events had grown larger and more significant, some had remained small, but after the initial wide spread of the targets they came in tighter, closer, until it became obvious just why the chain had been set in motion. Something that couldn’t have happened now did, and nobody but Yoz would have realised.

Questions had been asked, but the changes had been so insignificant that it all made perfect sense from the inside; it was only once you went Outside and sifted the substance of reality and time through the fingers of the mind that the discrepancies showed up. Very very clever indeed - but did it matter?

Yoz retreated Outside the Universe and watched it for a bit, mentally chewing on her lip. Yes, there was the ‘distract Yoz’ aspect of it. This was true. But she wasn’t so conceited that she thought every little blip in the smooth running of reality pertained to her; this could conceivably be aimed at somebody else - as unlikely as Rule One made that. And so far there were no connections between the killings - which showed up as glaring, ugly purple stains of hatred against the steady glow of Life that lit the coruscating globe of Reality from the inside - and the darting, tiny changes that she now understood.

 _So look closer_. She dived back through the skin of the Universe and tightened her focus, sniffed around the killings, rubbed her mental essence against them and followed the bloodied tracks that led from each scene. There had to be a pattern--

And there it was. She sat back, rocked in surprise; not what she’d expected, for sure. But it was there.

She still wasn’t sure of the why, exactly, but it was a connection. And each of the murders had a purpose beyond simple extinction; the ethereal tracks would lead a little way from the place and time, then fold themselves into a particular echo formation of a sigil she’d seen before. Only this time it was smaller, tighter, just as fierce but a damn sight easier to overlook.

Rocketing back to her body, mind awhirl with what she’d discovered, Yoz opened her eyes and stared at the cobwebs in the corner of the room.

“Mother _fucker_ ,” she said to the empty air, and went to prepare for the meeting.

~*~

Dirk paced, fretful. Thoughts rolled in his head, no sooner settling long enough for him to consider the shape of them than they lifted again in a whirl of confusion, scattered his concentration to the four winds.

He lit a cigarette and leaned on the sill of the open window, stared up at the glimmer of silver that was the almost full moon hanging over the city. Maybe he should play, pick up his bass and let the rumble of the strings soothe his psyche; maybe he should go out, walk for a while, clear his head with exercise and fresh air. Maybe he should--

Turning from the cool breeze with a curse he began to pace again. He knew what he wanted to do. He wanted to call Yoz and talk to her, think his way out loud through what was making him so uneasy about these dates without the worry that the person he was talking to thought him crazy. But the Magus didn’t have a phone, not a cell, not a landline. He’d tried to ask her about it a time or two, but she’d always brushed him off; I’ll be there when you need me, she said.

Yes, he’d replied, but what about when I just want you?

She’d shrugged and laughed. We don’t always get what we want, she’d told him.

Remembering something from the last time they’d seen her he went to his desk, rummaged through the drawers until his fingertips encountered what he was looking for under a pile of old receipts. It always seemed to hide; never in the place he’d last left it, although usually in the same general vicinity. Perhaps it was an echo of the personality of the one whose sigil it was, he thought to himself as he turned the pendant over in his fingers, brow creased.

He knew that the silvery ornament was linked to the Magus, somehow, although he’d never got the trick of using it to contact her the way Kai had.

Long legs carried him across the room and back as he resumed his uneasy stride, this time rubbing his thumb across the pendant clutched tight in his hand. Maybe she would feel his disquiet, realise how much he wanted to talk to her--

Needed, he realised. He needed to talk to her. He wanted to do it as she was laid in his arms, or curled against him on a sofa; he missed the physical contact, the way that small, strong body could mould itself to him and make him feel as randy as a teenager again - usually right before she told him something that would make him laugh. 

If he didn’t hear anything soon he’d have to bite the bullet and talk to Henjo, or Dan. They’d understand. Kai had already made it clear he wasn’t prepared to discuss it, and if at all possible he wanted to avoid making either of the others feeling like they had to take sides....

He paced, and thought, and worried. Maybe she would hear him.

~*~

Half past eleven, Waterloo station. The steady rumble of trains had begun to thin out, and soon the place would shut down for the night; the last commuters were long gone, and midweek there weren’t the throngs of revellers that rushed to catch the last train that there would be come the weekend. It was ready to receive whatever clandestine visitors were approaching, darker things than simply travel in mind.

Sweeney lurked in the shadows, waited for the Magus to show up and watched the last of the post-business drinkers tumble out of the pub opposite. He puffed on a cigarette, the bright red glow of the coal the only thing visible in the darkness beside the glitter of his dark eyes.

“Evening Sweeney - eaten any good livers lately?”

The rat bared his teeth, yellowed with nicotine even in his human form, blew a plume of smoke at her before he dropped the dog end and ground it out under his heel. “Not since last night, mate. You ready?”

“As I’ll ever be.”

Following the shapeshifter into the brightly lit concourse Yoz was on high alert, every sense snapped to attention in order not to miss a thing. She’d been asked here to parley and her safety had been guaranteed, it was true; but she’d been in enough tight spots before to know that the best laid plans could go tits up in a heartbeat if one wasn’t careful. 

Especially when one was walking into a crowd of upset, nervous shapeshifters who - physically, at least - were far stronger and faster than she. She was going to be outnumbered by quite some way, and would to have to stay very sharp indeed if trouble was to be avoided.

Sweeney paused by a blue-painted fire door that bore the legend ‘Staff only’; he waited for her, dark eyes gleaming with wicked amusement. He positively relished the thought of leading her into something she’d have trouble escaping from, she realised; it wasn’t that there was treachery planned, more that he’d heard a lot about her and planned on enjoying watching her work. Plus, of course, he had a far better idea than she of just the sort of emotional shitstorm she was going to walk into.

They stood there for a moment before she barked a short laugh and waved him on. “Lay on, Macduff,” she said with a cock of an eyebrow.

“And damned be him that first cries hold, enough?” he replied with a smile.

“Something like that. Come on, let’s go.”

He shrugged, and pushed his way through the door to lead her into the depths of the station.

~*~

The area they slipped into was very different from the places that the public were allowed access to. First of all the workmanlike domains of the station staff, the lockers and pegs and hooks for coats, the racks for headgear and faded notices tacked to cork boards covered with frayed green felt. Fire extinguishers and safety notices, dust and cobwebs and a smell of tea and mouldered paint and furniture polish. Institutional and safe, almost unchanged from when the great station first emerged from the mind of its Victorian designer. 

Ghosts of the past whispered in the silence, long dead workmen walked the places they’d devoted their lives to keeping running on time. History breathed in the corridors, the now and then overlapping with only the cut of their uniforms to tell them apart. Steam and diesel, horsepower muscled and electrical, men and boys and tea ladies and manners and change and coins and computers--

Then through more doors, flaked gloss paint chipped and hinges stiffer and more rusted, each subsequent turn of the labyrinth taking them to an area less travelled, somewhere more mysterious. And at last a final hurdle, a grating that appeared to be solidly bolted shut, no access to anybody - never mind authorisation, pal, Keep The Fuck Out.

“Down here,” said Sweeney, needlessly. His voice whispered down the tunnels and back, chuckled with damp and wickedness on its return; Yoz shrugged, watched him like a hawk while he undid a couple of screws to swing the ancient iron grating back. Reaching into his pocket he brought out a tiny torch, and flicked the switch with a thumbnail that was longer than it had been when they entered the place.

Change hovered in the musty air, and a sense of challenge; Yoz braced herself, sure that some kind of test was forthcoming. Maybe she’d have to follow him unseen, or find her own way to their King--

Rustling around them. Switchback twist of tunnel, leading ever down under the city. Rumbling a heartbeat away that grew to a scream and rush of rank, hot air; the working tunnels intersected the abandoned here, and the swirl of late homebound commuters flashed topside reality through the mysteries of the shapeshifter underworld, so very much older and so very hidden to the mundane mind. Shrieking rails fell quiet once more, nothing but a whisper as the pair picked their way across the track to another dark hole in the wall. Sweeney hopped up, glanced back over his shoulder at the Magus; she nodded, and he turned and vanished into the dark.

This was where the worlds separated for good. This place, this very threshold, was where above became below, and the ‘shifter held sway.

This was the Kingdom of the Rat.

~*~

They paused once more before they arrived, Sweeney calmly stripping before he shoved his clothes into a small alcove in the brick wall, then turned back to her with a wink. “Going down there hairless is considered pretty rude - for us,” he said, then bent his spine to shudder through the transformation.

Unlike the night before, this time he stopped in his half-rat form. All the shapeshifters had three basic forms; the human, their full animal body, and one that was half way between the two. What stood before her now was a monstrous humanoid rat, long head that swung back and forth to scent the slow currents of air and pick up the vibrations of other life. His tail made a scraping sound as it stirred in the dusty muck of the floor, and the long claws of his hind feet drew deep parallel scratches; he stretched his back, shoved his front paws into the small of it to twist and pop, settled back down with a shake and a grin.

“Come on then,” he murmured, voice deeper and more harsh by being forced through the less-than-human vocal apparatus. 

She shrugged, then followed his long strides into the new tunnel, watching the way his scaly tail swayed behind him as he made his way into the dark.

~*~

The space they emerged into was, no doubt, probably supposed to impress her. And if she hadn’t already been familiar with the hidden areas beneath London she may well have been; but the truth was that she’d visited all the abandoned underground stations, used the twisted network of half collapsed, derelict and never finished tunnels to get around the city unseen many, many times. Mad schemes by Victorian inventors, dried up stream beds bricked in centuries ago, ambitious projects that were never finished; quite apart from the known and mapped city-beneath-a-city there was as much that was uncharted, unknown and little understood that waited to trap the unwary traveler.

Sewer workers and maintenance men trod carefully, and watched their maps; people had vanished down here without a trace, odd noises drifted out of the dark and there was always movement right on the edge of your vision--

The King squatted on a throne made of the bones of such wanderers, lashed and tied with skulls as finials, the whiteness of recent death contrasted with the yellowed ivory of skeletons robbed from more ancient graves.

His coat gleamed dirty white in the dark, his milky blind eyes tracking the Magus with unerring accuracy when she followed Sweeney into the dim circle of light thrown by the flickering oil lamp hung high above him. Individuals drew back, the quiet susurration of many voices fading to a rustle of uneasy enquiry all around her in the shadows. She tilted her head back and narrowed her eyes against the flare of her lighter, took a moment to spark up a cigarette before she folded her arms and stood hipshot, open for the inspection of all who watched.

It was a who’s-who of the shapeshifter communities of London.

Bulky in the gloom were the pigs; although ‘pig’ was something of a misnomer, ‘boar’ being rather closer. A huge male stood closest to her, shuffled his hooves in the sifted muck of ages, his thick neck and stiff, bristled mane catching the light against the planes of muscle, hair and bone. His tusks gleamed, and his small, pale grey eyes sized her up; never mind any jokes about swine, the boars had the strength - even in this halfway form - to bite through solid steel, brawny arms solid with muscle and tendon more than capable of breaking her to pieces, should they so choose.

Rustling in quick, nervous movement further back were the mustelids, the slender form more common in the UK; something between a marten and a polecat, they were long bodied and sinuous, sharp of fang and swift of movement. Predators as much as any wolf they tended to move, live and work alone, hunted the dark places of the city where the larger predators couldn’t - or wouldn’t - go.

A good number of foxes, their russet coats brown in the darkness. They were more common in the cities than the countryside these days; they’d made the switch to urban life with ease, unlike their other canid cousins the wolves. They whispered amongst themselves, stared at her, and she caught the flash of sharp teeth in the dark.

Many rats - as you would imagine for being in the heart of their territory - and a fair sprinkle of cats; the felines eyed their brethren with unease, unaccustomed to sharing space peaceably with a species they often hunted for the sheer hell of it. The sounders of boars tended to ignore other shapeshifters except for the wolves - only one representative of which was present - although in other parts of Europe they dealt with the heavier, wolverine-type of mustelid just as often, and just as sharply, no love being lost between the species. The cats hunted the rats and made constant, complicated alliances with the weasels, the rats made shift in the cities and ruled their own in a brawling, untidy mess that the others looked on with distaste from afar.

There were even a few individuals of the more exotic races of cats, a tiger and several leopards; as immigrants had made their way to London from across the globe, their own ‘shifters had come with them. They were hanging back in the deep shadows, uncomfortable about the proximity to their more native brethren.

Things must, she thought, be serious to bring them all together like this; Yoz grinned at the King and cocked her head, insolence in every line of her stance.

“So. How’s tricks down in the underground then, mate?”

The King shuffled on his throne and wrinkled his nose, bared huge yellow chisels at her. One of the younger rats, a brawny individual with a mottled brown coat and black eyes that glittered with anger, stepped toward her with a snarl; she eyed him, not moving from his aggression even when he pushed his sharp muzzle close to her face and snapped, demanded respect for his liege in a voice like gravel.

All the ‘shifters present froze; the King growled at his young defender, and Sweeney burst from the shadows to hit the youth in the side, rolled him over in the dirt and sank his teeth into his shoulder.

The scuffle was short, although savage; she watched it all without expression, waited until the combatants withdrew with a hiss before turning her attention back to the blind white rat on the throne.

“You try our patience, Magus,” said the King, and she rolled one shoulder up in a half shrug.

“This is pointless,” snapped the boar, stepping closer to the King and examining Yoz with an unfriendly gaze. “I fail to see what she can do to help.”

Yoz tipped her head back and returned the boar’s gaze coolly. Topping six feet, the bristles on his head forming an untidy mohawk that made him look even taller, his wedge shaped skull pointed toward her with the muscular snout wrinkled in a growl. He was huge; swelling his chest with air as she looked back at him he flexed his shoulders, showing her that, physically, she was no match for him.

Taking a chance, she turned her back on him and cocked an eyebrow at the King.

“Showboating aside,” she said with a sigh, “what do you actually _want?_ ”

The King grinned at her, and the boar sputtered with fury at being ignored in such a cavalier fashion. “Gill is not accustomed to be treated with such a lack of respect. If you do not possess the skill to match such bravado--”

“Skill? Fuck,” she snorted a cloud of smoke, then dropped the cigarette and ground it out. “Depends what you want. You do know who I am?”

“Yolanda the Magus,” came a new voice, lilting from the darkness, “balanced between Heaven and Hell, standing alone against the Darkness and always amenable to becoming embroiled in the eternal battle, am I right?”

She turned her head and eyed the mustelid who’d joined them, long body swaying as she moved through the press of individuals to get closer to the Magus. “That’s one way of looking at it.”

“You can find who’s killing us and why,” said the weasel, then folded her arms across the cream of her chest fur, black eyes lit with a gleam in the darkness of her mask-like facial markings.

“Indeed,” added the King, who watched the exchange with ears flickering, his other senses filling in the information that his blind eyes could not give him, “we have heard that if you put your mind to a problem there is little you cannot achieve.”

“Flattering,” agreed Yoz, “and mostly true. So let’s say I find out who this person is; then what? You want me to bring him to you, or find out why he’s doing it or what?”

“Bring us his head,” grunted Gill, and there was a murmur of agreement from the gathering.

“I don’t do assassinations. Not anymore,” she said sharply.

“In case your handsome German disapproves?” said the weasel with a smirk.

The temperature dropped a few degrees, and the gathering held its breath.

“You can leave him out of it,” said the Magus, keeping her tone as inflectionless as possible; the look she shot at the mustelid female, however, was filled with the promise of violence. She swished her tail, smirked and bowed, wordlessly acknowledging the vow that Yoz had just made if she dared to bring the subject up again.

“Bring them to us - or, if that is not possible,” replied the King, smoothing the awkward moment over, “bring word as to where they can be found and cornered. We shall do the rest.”

“Some of my people,” rasped a new voice, and the largest of the male cats stepped into the light, “have been found without their skins. I owe the person who took them much suffering.”

Yoz cocked an eyebrow. “I read about that. The skins would retain their fur, would they not?”

“Yes. The bodies return to their...human...form.”

“So a catamount skin coat might be a dead giveaway then. You tried Ebay?”

The cat yowled and coiled his body at her, fury a crackle of fire in the wide green eyes. The King of the rats snapped a sharp word at the cat - who subsided with an unhappy growl - then addressed the Magus with wrath in his tone.

“We have all suffered, Magus! My own son was trapped and killed not a week ago - we found his remains dumped in an alley, although whatever _human_ had done this had not bothered to leave us his head.”

The King swept the long fingers of one paw across his eyes and fought to get his emotions under control. “My son,” he said, and his voice broke with the pain of it, “was young, and strong. He was the finest of us...and he died badly, Magus. This needs to stop. Before we are all destroyed.”

Something touched Yoz’ mind, and she whirled to stare into the corners of the abandoned station, stretched out her senses to probe the dark corners that she might find the new presence that had whispered along her nerve endings. Something darkly familiar, and unwelcome--

“The finest,” sneered a voice, rich and smooth where the timbre of the ‘shifters was rough, “does not say much, King rat. But we are dying too, Magus, and are no more capable of discovering the culprit than our more bestial cousins here.”

Growling under her breath, Yoz lit another cigarette and was rather pleased to see that her hands remained steady, not a hint of the agitation she felt inside with the arrival of the newest creature.

“I could give a shit what happens to you bastards,” she said, once she was sure her voice would remain as steady as her fingers.

“But you cannot choose, can you?” said the young man that paced with inhuman grace through the crowd that fell back, fearful, at his approach. “You cannot say, I will save this one and that one but not you. If you take this job,” and the vampire infused the word _job_ with all the disdain of an aristocrat, “then you work for us all. Defend us against the Darkness, mistress Yolanda!” 

He stopped before her, spread his arms and smiled down at her. She glared at him, mismatched eyes glittering with dislike; vampires were one thing from the inhuman world that she utterly loathed. Indirectly, they had caused her great fall, taken from her the man she loved when she was young and still new to the horrors of being a Magus. In her pain and fury she had sold her soul for power, and had fought to get it back ever since. Or to cheat the forces of Hell from taking it, whichever.

The vampires found this amusing, although she had in some small way attempted to pay them back by destroying their goddess some years before. A state of undeclared war existed in perpetuity between Yolanda and the vampires; now, it seemed, she would at least in part be working for them. It appeared that one should never say never after all.

“James,” said the King, calm now, “we informed you of the time of our gathering. You are late.”

“Fashionably so,” smiled the vampire, grey eyes as clear and serene as the sky, “and I don’t believe I have missed much. Some intimidation, a little posturing?”

Despite herself, Yoz snorted.

“Quite so,” said the vampire, then turned back to the Magus. “As I am sure our brutish brethren have informed you, we cannot find whoever has taken it upon themselves to rid the planet of the influence of non-humans.”

Something nudged her mind again. _Rid the planet of--_

“Anyone spoken to the Weavers?”

“They do not deign to communicate with the likes of us,” smirked the vampire, and the rustle of discontent that shuffled through the nervous crowd indicated agreement. Yoz chewed on her lip; some very unwelcome ideas were beginning to come together in her head, and she didn’t like the shape of them one bit. All this was beginning to sound unpleasantly familiar....

“And she takes the first steps on the road,” murmured the weasel, eyes bright.

“Indeed she does, oh my pungently polecatty ally,” replied the vampire smoothly. The mustelid shot him a glare.

Yoz ignored them. “I’m going to need a list of who was killed and when - and this isn’t just happening in London, is it?”

“All the great cities,” sighed the King.

“Then I need to know when and where the other killings happened, too.”

The vampire pushed his hand inside his jacket, the expensive leather creaking as he did so. “Already prepared,” he told her, and handed her a neatly bound sheaf of printouts.

She dropped him a swift nod of grudging thanks - to which he replied with a florid bow - she paged through it with a low whistle. “This is big. Someone’s been awfully busy--”

“But can you _do_ it?” snapped Gill. The vampire waved one long hand in front of his nose, shot the Magus an amused look. Gill grumbled, took a step toward the vampire with his fists clenched.

“Don’t,” said Yoz, sharply. “And yes, course I can. I’m going to have to do a lot of digging about, though, so I can’t give you an accurate timeframe.”

“How will we contact you?”

“Sweeney found me all right, didn’t he?” she said, distracted.

“But--”

“And if you lot can’t find me, send a bloodsucker,” she added, “they always know where I am, bastards.” 

James the vampire pulled a face at her, and she turned on him in exasperation. “Look, you know how I feel about you lot, right? But much as I hate to admit it, you’re right - I can’t look into one part of this and not the other. This person has to be stopped, fine. Yeah. But be aware - if they were just taking vampires, I wouldn’t be fucking bothering now matter how nicely I was asked. Are we clear on this?”

“Crystal,” snapped the vampire, and turned his back on her to stalk off. All watched him go, staring after the tight shoulders and stiff back long after the vampire had been lost to sight.

“So now I’ve pissed off fully half our allies, I’d better get to work,” she said, and winked at the King. 

“Be careful, Magus.”

“Always,” she replied, and with a bow slipped out of the station before any of the ‘shifters present could even think to begin tracking her.

_~~tbc~~_


	4. Three

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Yoz plotted, smoked, and drank her tea; by the time the kettle was on again she was sure she knew where to start—although she doubted that anyone was going to be particularly pleased to see her.

_****_

Chapter Three

Dirk dreamed of a lonely house, huge and brooding atop a windswept hill.

He walked through the place, knowing it was empty and deserted, and examined the dusty knick-knacks that covered every available flat surface. He picked them up, turned them over in his fingers; whatever he was looking for wasn’t there, and he moved on. 

Barefoot, he padded along the darkened corridors. The air was stale and smelled of dust, and he felt neither cold nor heat; despite wearing nothing but the thin pyjama bottoms he usually slept in when it was cold, he couldn’t feel any movement of air against his skin. This place just hung, breathless, in the arch of his mind.

Room after room, each one filled with the bits and pieces of his life. Discarded instruments, memorabilia, things he’d forgotten he’d ever had or thrown away years before. Each room was different and represented a moment, a piece of his life long gone. Childhood, adolescence, school years and college, adulthood and all the many and varied horrors and joys it had contained, all boiled down to myriad dusty rooms filled with useless clutter.

And then locked doors. Doors with blood seeping underneath them; legacy of last year’s possession, no doubt. But those memories were gone, expunged and removed and--

But still, he knew they were there. Just knowing that he’d done those things - even though he could no longer remember _what_ , exactly, he’d done - was enough to make his heart sink. That he could, even when under the control of another, do such evil things was still a source of shame and guilt. Something inside him suggested that he should have fought harder, maybe even found some way to destroy himself before allowing the demon to force him to--

So thinking, he pushed the next door open and had to blink against warm, early spring sunshine; the air was fresh, cool with the tang of the nearby pine forest and carried a hint of furniture polish and fresh linen. He remembered this place, although it had been rather different the last time he’d seen it. The last time he’d been there the roof had fallen in, nearly killing him after a shell had blown out part of the front of the Harzberg House, a Rosicrucian stronghold where Yoz had tried to stash them. To be safe.

It hadn’t been terribly successful.

He leaned on the doorframe, and smiled at the figure perched in the window smoking a cigarette.

“Hello Yoz.”

She rolled her head to the side and smiled at him, the skin at the corner of her eyes crinkled with the apparent delight of seeing him again.

“Alright Dirk. How’s tricks?”

~*~

“Tobi, what the fuck are you--”

Felix rolled his eyes at Dirk, who’d just entered the rehearsal room with his guitar and a puzzled frown.

“What’s he up to this time?”

“Says he’s loosening up for the tour--”

Tobi bounded past them, grabbed Dirk round the shoulders and swung him in a circle. Felix shook his head.

“I think someone’s been feeding him sugar again, personally.”

“Don’t be such a misery, Bohnke!” laughed Tobi, and bounced off again to hurdle the amps scattered in such a haphazard fashion around the room.

Dirk looked at Felix, who shrugged and rolled his eyes. Yes, Tobi was always energised after a full moon - as was he - but he hid the energy surge a little better than his friend did. He was amazed nobody had put two and two together, quite honestly, and displays like the one he was putting on at the moment really didn’t help any with secrecy.

Jens shouldered his way through the door, balancing a very full coffee cup in one hand, his guitar case in the other and with a paper bag clenched between his teeth.

“Morning Jens!” sang Tobi, paused for a moment on top of Eggi’s bass cabinet before doing a forward flip off it to land on his feet. “Ta-daaaaa!”

Jens dumped his guitar next to Eggi, who was slumped on the couch at the back of the room, watching his friend dance around with a faintly disgusted expression. Jens retrieved the paper bag from his mouth and sighed.

“He sugar high?”

“Not yet I’m not,” the man in question grinned, bounded over to give Jens a hug and steal one of the donuts from his bag.

“Hey!”

Dirk ambled over, peered into the bag and stole another donut. “Thanks,” he muttered through a mouthful of dough and sugar, sidestepping the weak kick Jens aimed at him.

“Stop stealing my breakfast!”

“It’s bad for you,” called a voice from the other side of the room, followed by a horrible crashing noise as Tobi misjudged a leap and went headfirst into the drumkit.

Four voices yelled his name, and his friends made their way - with much eye rolling and many sarcastic comments - to rescue him from the wreckage of the drums. He lay there, expression rather sheepish, while the four of them deconstructed the kit around him, in order to spare it further damage.

“Sorry, Felix....”

“Fucking idiot.”

Jens shook his head. “Do you think we can get some work done? Maybe?”

Tobi’s head came up and he grinned. “Yeah! I just need to loosen up a bit more--”

And he was off again to bound around the room, make fun of the rest of them, tease the techs setting up the equipment and generally being as annoying as he knew how. Felix put his head in his hands, and heaved a big, sad sigh.

Eggi patted him on the shoulder. “This too shall pass,” he said, tone philosophical.

“Before or after I kill him?”

~*~

“I’m dreaming, aren’t I?”

“Course you are.”

“So none of this is real.”

The woman laughed, hopped down from the window and crossed the room to him, placed the palms of both hands on his chest. He could feel the warmth of her skin against his, the tiny movements of her fingers over him. He looked down with a smile, trapped her hands against him; she snorted, leaned in to nuzzle her face into the hollow of his throat.

“Define reality, my friend.”

He rolled his eyes. “Typical Yoz--”

“Never a straight answer when you want one?” she grinned, leaning back to look deep into his eyes.

“Something like that.”

Taking his hand she led him over to the bed, pushed him to sit on the end of it then dragged a chair out from under the desk and spun it, straddling it cowboy-fashion. Watching him with an expression somewhere between fondness and amusement she waved him to silence when he went to speak.

“I don’t have long, so listen. Yes, you’re dreaming - but I am really in your mind. I ducked the Weavers and sneaked across the Dreaming to link up with you. You’re in a level of dream you’ve never been to before - you can act and feel and, well, it’s just like being awake but not. Lucid dreaming and then some.”

His eyes widened, and she snorted. 

“Yeah, there’s going to be hell to pay when they catch up with me. Still, I’m always in the shit with them so what’s the difference? Anyway. I’m kind of busy right now, but I’ll be dropping in on you sometime over the next few days.”

“The tour?”

She let out a long breath through her nose, then twisted sideways to retrieve the packet of cigarettes on the desk behind her. “Maybe,” she replied, tossing pack and lighter to him once she’d lit her own. “I’m assuming, from the way you said it, that you’re worried?”

His turn to shrug, and he ducked his face to avoid her eye while he lit his own smoke. “Sort of.”

A bark of laughter almost had him blushing for the knowing cynicism in it. “Oh yeah. I could feel you angsting about _something_ all the way over in the UK - and now you’re going to lie to me? Gosh, thanks mate.”

Flinging his arms up he flopped back on the bed. “Fine! Yes, I’m worried. It just doesn’t seem possible, is all - everything’s come together so fast, and it’s all been so easy. And preparing for a tour - no matter how short - is many things, but it certainly isn’t easy.”

She stared at him for a moment, face thoughtful. “How’s Kai been?”

“Oh, you couldn’t break into his head to find out?”

The thoughtful expression segued into a dirty look. “No, actually, I couldn’t. And I didn’t have time to deconstruct his barriers so I came to see you instead. You’d rather I left?”

She rose from the chair, swung her leg over it and turned away from him. He called to her, rose and touched her arm; she halted, leaned away from him, stared at the open window instead of meeting his eye.

“Look,” he said, and let his hand drop. “I’m worried. Something about this doesn’t...it doesn’t feel right. And you told us to pay more attention to our hunches, yes?”

She wrung one hand across the back of her neck, eyed him sideways with an unhappy sigh. “All true. But there just seems to be an awful lot of shit going down right now--”

Dirk took her hand, and drew her to sit beside him on the bed. She couldn't say that she was entirely surprised when he stretched out on his back, pulled her across until she was nestled into his side, her head on his chest, listening to the slow, steady thump of his heart under her ear.

He began to talk, told her about the plans Kai was making, how it had all fallen into place. Not so much as a single hitch, even those that had plans for the off season being available, said plans falling through at the most convenient time for the gigs. Bands had cancelled, leaving venues available and desperate for the business; money had been found in the record company coffers, and on the whole it looked like the winds of fortune were - finally - blowing in the right direction for them.

Which made Dirk suspicious.

“It could all be coincidence,” murmured Yoz, shuffling closer into his side. His snort echoed through his chest, the rumble under her ear making her smile.

“Some of it, sure,” he said, “but all of it? It doesn’t smell right, Yoz.”

She rolled over, rested her chin on her hands on his chest. “Have you picked up any hints that it might not be just luck?”

He stared into the mismatched gaze, thought hard while he watched the shifting shades of brown and blue half hidden by her fringe. 

“Nothing...overt,” he said slowly, “but there’s just a little - tingle? Yeah. Best word I can use to describe it.”

“What do the others say?”

“Dan’s happy we can have Eero with us again,” and she laughed at his droll expression, “Henjo says the buildings are all happy, and Kai...well, you know what Kai’s like when he’s on a mission.”

“Focused?”

“That’s one way of putting it.”

She snorted. “Think he’s been tampered with?”

Dirk blinked at her, his eyebrows raised. “I never thought of that. How would I tell?”

“Good point - without the ability to touch his mind you can’t. Henjo might be able to, if only by asking the building if it had seen anything odd happen.”

He laughed. “That still seems very strange!”

“The building thing? Yeah - I’ve never known anybody to have that kind of a skill so focused before. But hey, if it works... right?”

He sobered. “If it works, use it?” he asked her, his voice soft. She lowered her gaze.

“I guess so, yeah.”

They lay in silence for a while, her fingers drawing lazy circles on his chest. He tightened his arms around her, drew her up his chest until they were sprawled tight together, faces just inches apart. She looked him in the eye, and the sharp grin that had been forming changed to something... softer.

“I’m sorry,” he said, and she wriggled a little closer, dropped a light kiss on his lips.

“It’s OK,” she said. “I know what I do seems a bit harsh to you, sometimes....”

He felt her shrug in his arms, and rested his forehead on hers with a sigh. She felt him smile, and leaned back to get a better look at his face; his eyes were bright with mischief, and she had to laugh. He looked like a little boy contemplating doing something he knew was going to get him into trouble - but that would be so much fun he was going to do it anyway.

“So I can do whatever I want here?”

“Almost,” she said with a grin.

He pulled her close and kissed her. She sighed through her nose; his lips were as warm as she remembered, the hardness that pressed against her with the slow grind of his hips as insistent as ever. They broke the kiss, and she licked her lips.

“Even that,” she said with a quiet laugh. “But in dreams, I can do this--”

She snapped her fingers, and he burst out laughing when he realised that she’d evaporated their clothes with one swift gesture.

“That’s a neat trick,” he told her, then rolled her over until she was on her back, arms around his neck, chuckling up into his face. He didn’t wait, pressed down to kiss her; she growled when he slipped a thigh between hers, sliding along her heat and rubbing his cock against her hip. Time - always a flexible commodity in dreams - vanished entirely, and the pair of them murmured and gasped, rediscovered each other in the timeless dreamscape she had created for them.

He was nuzzling between her breasts, lost in the feel of warm flesh under his lips, delighting in their weight and fullness when she sat up, eyes wide. 

“Shit.”

“What?” Dirk rubbed his nose; she’d bolted upright so fast she’d almost flattened him, and even in dreams being knocked flat hurt.

“They’ve found me. Gotta go, mate,” and she bounded off the bed, cast a quick glance at the door before she began to weave her hands in a flowing, complicated pattern in front of her.

“Wait!”

She flicked a glance over her shoulder, her form - and the room around her - already beginning to fade.

“Go back, Dirk. I’ll see you soon, OK?”

She blew him a kiss and he was falling, his body flailing its way through a grey mist that hissed and pinched, his fall momentarily slowed then accelerated once more as he spun through confusion. Faster and colder, fear that grabbed at his limbs and froze his heart--

Dirk jerked awake with a cry, soaked in cold sweat and with a hardon that ached like a bad tooth. Fear and lust crowded his mind, and he ground his teeth in frustration; trust the Magus to leave him shaking with fright and with a hell of a case of blue balls to go with it. That was just her style.

He flopped back on the bed with a groan, throat working as he tried to get himself under control; she would be with him in a couple of days, she’d said, which didn’t help him with his current problem one bit. At the thought of that tight, curved, much be-inked body he gave in and stroked his hands down himself, cupped his balls in one palm even as he slid the other down to squeeze and pull at his hard cock. He would be sure to have a very stern word with her about this, but in the meantime--

He lost himself in a vision of the Magus, and buried his mind in sensation.

~*~

Yoz opened her eyes, and dived from the pallet she had been sitting cross legged on while she dreamwalked. She darted into the shadows of the dusty room, froze her presence so still that any watcher wouldn’t know she was there; all they would have seen was the flicker of movement after her mind had returned to her body.

The exercise was, she realised when the figure stepped out into the light, pointless.

Weavers possessed senses that were... unusual, at best. Their huge, bulbous scarlet eyes recorded what happened around them, but did not report it until it was no more; they saw the past, heard the present and felt the short term future. They claimed that such senses proved beyond a doubt that reality was more than the sum of its parts; they had set themselves to watch over and guard the realm of the dreaming mind, reading it as other species read the stars, or the entrails of animals. They championed the Light, but grudgingly admitted that the Darkness was part of what they called the Cosmic Plan; not afraid to steer the course of events if they felt they were veering too far away from their desired result they were powerful, stubborn, sometimes vicious and always dangerous in a gentle, understated sort of a way.

Yoz thought they were a bloody nuisance.

The Weaver stood in the centre of the room, relaxed and unafraid, turned its enormous eyes this way and that to examine the room. Yoz muttered under her breath, emerged from her hiding place and grabbed her cigarettes, threw herself onto the tatty sofa in the corner and eyed her visitor with disgust as she lit up.

“I might have known you fucking lot would show up at some point.”

The creature turned its mournful, enormous eyes on her and sighed. Medium height, unremarkable in appearance except for those huge, glistening eyes like damp red tennis balls. Gold flecks in the scarlet caught the light, and it blinked nictitating membranes across them to clear the sting of cigarette smoke.

“You are the Balanced One, and yet in your incessant arrogance cannot withstand the temptation to test our not eternal forbearance by invading our demesne uninvited to disrupt the delicate weave of the Dream--”

“Oh shut up. I wanted to see what he knew.”

“In addition to satisfying your - undeniably rapacious - carnal appetite? This obsession with the temporary veil of flesh is well known to the guardians of the Eternal Weave, Magus.”

“You were watching, you dirty bastard.”

The Weaver frowned at her. “Balanced One, you had obtruded upon our realm uninvited. You are skilful - we admit to that, in however grudging a fashion - but it is our function within the tapestry of Destiny to keep outside forces away from the frangible web of the Dream! And although you find this arduous - indeed, impossible - to incorporate into your own Universal Truth, this means that your presence is as inimical to the structure and the flow of the Dreaming Plane as is that of any other monster from the scourges of Otherspace.”

“Monster? Gee, thanks.”

It flung its arms in the air and sighed. “It is known to us what you seek--”

“Yeah, but do you know who? You could make my life a lot fucking easier if you’d tell me who it is now, you know.”

It shot her a dirty look, and she replied with a big, open grin that radiated friendly enthusiasm.

“Do not bait us, Magus,” it told her, softly. She sat forward, rested her forearms on her knees and tapped her thumbs together, squinted a glare at it through the haze of cigarette smoke.

“Then stop getting in my fucking way. I’ve warned you lot about this before--”

“As you have been warned in your turn! However...,” and it cocked its head, expression sliding into the half-asleep, almost ecstatic mode she’d learned to recognise as one Weaver communicating with the others. Neither genuinely telepathic nor a true hive mind, each Weaver nevertheless was not entirely individual; they shared a link that defied explanation and, as a minor side effect, irritated Yoz beyond belief with its supercilious certainty. “The quest you are engaged upon is sufficiently serious that, with accurate guidance and evidencing the correct respect for the ether in which it spreads, you may visit the Dreaming to continue gathering information. We shall permit such an - abbreviated - intrusion.”

“Thanks.”

“It shall, however, be brief. There shall be no carnal exploration of the astral bodies of the dreamers.”

“Spoilsport.”

It glared at her, and she grinned back at it. Now the real horse trading could begin.

~*~

“Oh, come _on_.”

The Weaver had flopped onto an enormous bean bag that Yoz kept tucked in a corner, a relic of some long-lost previous occupant of the dingy little rooftop squat. A mug of tea rested by its elbow, although it had refused the offer of a cigarette; it sprawled in apparent comfort, jacket discarded next to it on the floor, and watched her measure the room with her steps, a sly expression on its face. Fingers steepled before it, it was the very epitome of relaxation; it - and, presumably, the others of its kind it was linked with - looked to be enjoying the battle of wits with the short-tempered Magus they found so useful.

She stalked past it, took another drag on the ‘n’th cigarette of the evening. The atmosphere was heavy with smoke, stuffy and close, and she had stripped down to her favoured outfit of black halter top and saggy cargo pants, even foregoing her boots in deference to the warmth of the room. The Weaver watched her, unsmiling but amused; she turned and glared at it, then pointed her cigarette.

“Give me Kai.”

“That is not possible.”

“Yes it is. Give me Kai - I bet the answers are all locked up in that ginger nut of his, and I can be off and get this job done before you know it.”

“We know all of the things that move in this thread of space and time - it is unlikely that even one as skilful as yourself could--”

“Oh please. Figure of speech and you know it. Give me Kai.”

It shook its head with a smirk, and she huffed at it. She hadn’t expected it to give in, but it had been worth a try; the Weavers called Kai the Shining One, and he was far too important to them to allow her to mess about with his treasured (and very well guarded) dreaming space.

Well, fine. She’d spoken to Dirk, so she didn’t really need any of the Rays to give her an opinion; no, perhaps she could explore the other bands they were going to be touring with. Yes... potential there. If they’d been messed about with then one of them may have noticed something odd, or out of place - and information like that she could use.

“Give me Tobi.”

It cocked its head at her, and she swore.

“Oh, come _on_. You are not telling me that he is also some mystical wizzwatch that’s going to be the saviour of something or other? I can’t be that fucking unlucky, surely to God.”

It tightened its lips.

“Shit! I tell you - damn. What is your name, anyway? Hard to shout at someone properly unless you know their name.”

The Weaver waved its long fingers in front of its face, gave her a strange little smile before it spoke. “This element of the watchers of the Eternal Dream is known amongst both fellows and Outsiders as Valdrin. Labels matter little here, Magus; you may express your limited opinion in as loud a fashion as you wish, but this path of consequence will not be altered.”

“Shouting won’t help, huh?”

Valdrin blinked, again wearing that secretive, smug little smile, and shook his head.

“Bugger. Right then. You won’t give me Tobi - and when I find out _why_ you are in so much trouble - so what about the others?”

She jumped up onto the sofa and bounced there, poised on the balls of her feet with her eyes all a-glitter with the adrenaline rush of trying to outwit an entire species. She’d fail, and she knew that; but with the Weavers there was always the possibility that they may let something slip, or drop a hint, or perhaps decide that they could be a little more helpful without being obvious about it --

The trick was spotting the useful bits and pieces amongst the flood of useless information, picking the meaning from the glut and tangle of words they used to cloud their true intentions. That if you got it wrong you could find yourself dead, betrayed or worse merely added spice to the activity.

“The others, the others,” she half-sang, hopping to the arm of the sofa then back to the seat. “But which one?”

Valdrin cocked his head. If you don’t know then I won’t tell you, the expression said, and she laughed at him.

“The tall dark quiet one, Jens of the pretty eyes? He sits back and watches, so might he have what I need? Or the blonde with the good chest and the receding hairline; but no, they’re both guitarists - and therefore probably as self centred as hurricanes. Maybe a tad harsh, but....”

She laughed again and bounced down from the sofa, going to stand at Valdrin’s feet. “Drummers look at the back of everybody - they sit there and they watch and they see it all. They feel it and they live it. Give me Felix.”

“Whilst your assessment is not entirely inaccurate as far as it goes--”

“Shit! Him too? You bastards.”

“--it would be premature of us - perhaps - to allow you access to his place in the Weave of Dream before you have had the opportunity to meet him in the flesh, and assess his character that way.”

Yoz cocked an eyebrow.

“Right then. If I can’t have the drummer, then the bassist is my next best bet, yeah? So give me the other Tobias - what do they call him, Eggi? Yeah. Give me Eggi. He’ll do.”

The Weaver nodded once, a small smile playing along his thin lips.

“Right, that’s one. Now one more--”

“The time grows short, Magus. Our Mother Universe turns and the threads of Darkness swarm ever deeper into the weave....”

“Andi. Let me into Andreas’ head - I still say the frontman is my best bet.”

Valdrin rose to his feet, the sparse economy of motion making even Yoz smile. Weavers could be devious bastards but once they’d made their collective minds up they didn’t hang about. He strode over to her, and extended a long-fingered hand. She cocked her head at him, crushed the cigarette end out in the overflowing ashtray and took it; the pulse of power was waiting for her, a warm coil of force through her veins from where their skin connected.

“Are you prepared for the journey, Magus?”

“I was born ready, Valdrin.”

“That seems at best highly unlikely. Even for the One balanced on such a knife edge between the Darkness and the Light.”

“Are we going or talking?”

The Weaver tilted its head, and in a heartbeat there was nothing to disturb the air in the dusty, cluttered room but the last shreds of tobacco smoke.

~*~

The sofa overturned and dumped Eggi, Tobi and Dirk in a snorting, sputtering heap on the rug behind it. Tobi rolled free, darted back to watch the other two curse and grunt while they attempted to stop each other getting up; he laughed, hair sticking up in random spikes as he danced from foot to foot and waited for the next move.

“Come back here!” yelled Dirk, still tangled in the sofa cushions. Eggi crawled out, rolled on his back and laughed in short, quick bursts as he got his breath back; he couldn’t remember what had started the battle, but just as soon as he could breathe he was going to--

“Well. I come to find this butch rock star and what do I find? All sorts of bloody homo-erotic subcontent.”

Eggi propped himself up on his elbows, frowned. What the...?

“You lot never cease to amaze me, you know that?”

As far as he knew he’d never seen the person now leaning on the side of the overturned sofa. This woman, in fact. Why was he dreaming about someone he’d never seen before?

And anyway, she wasn’t his type.

“If you’re looking for some six foot plus blonde Amazon you’re going to be a wee bit disappointed with me, pal. Anyway, from the looks of things--”

She moved around the sofa and squatted by Dirk’s head, eyed his naked chest with a smirk.

“--girls aren’t your type. Interesting.”

He scrambled to his feet. Tobi and Dirk had frozen; Dirk’s blonde hair still spread behind his head like a fan, and Tobi was up on the balls of his feet, ready to either make a run for it or tackle one of them back to the floor. Both had grins on their faces; they were just horsing around, the same as any other day when they were all together and had an excess of energy. And weren’t recording. Or doing anything else that came under the heading of ‘work’.

He supposed it might look a bit... suspicious... to someone who didn’t know them. But he was dreaming, and dreams weren’t supposed to make sense - right?

“Normally?” the woman continued, now with a very nasty grin around the cigarette end she had firmly clamped between her teeth, “you’d be right. This time, though, you’re so far off base as to be well and truly in the wrong.”

Eggi pushed his hair off his forehead, out of his eyes, and felt a bit bewildered. She was reading his mind?

“I’m _in_ your mind, you bloody fool. So reading it isn’t exactly hard - and there’s not a lot going on in here, is there? Well. Nothing to write home about, from what I can see.”

“Who are you? And why am I dreaming about you?”

She laughed, and with a wave of her hand changed the scenery. The rehearsal room had vanished, along with the sofa and his friends; now they were in what appeared to be a rustic cabin of some type, all comfortable furniture and pine-panelled walls, a flickering fire and deep bearskin rug in front of it. The woman eyed the room critically; her black hair flopped over one eye, and she flipped it back with a snort. When she pushed a hand through it to tuck a stray strand behind her ear Eggi noticed that she had more tattoos than he’d ever seen on a woman before.

In fact, now he looked a bit closer... she had more tattoos than he’d ever seen on _anybody_ before. Even on her hands. And her arms, shoulders, neck, chest (what he could see of it above the vest top that showed all that - tattooed - cleavage, he amended mentally)... everywhere.

He wondered how far they stretched, and she groaned.

“Oh, do sit down. Always the first sodding question - how much skin? Well my friend, all of it. And I mean all and no you can’t see it. Siddown. We need to talk.”

~*~

Andi sat on his porch in the late afternoon sunshine, looked out toward the sea, smoked his cigar and drank his wine and was content.

He wasn’t sure what he was so content about, but whatever it was it felt good. Good to have all the normal worries and nagging concerns silenced for a little while, and to sit here and soak up the peace and quiet for just a little while. He should make the effort to do this more often, come to think of it--

“Well I must say, this is far more civilised,” said a voice. He’d heard it before, a time or two; it was the strange little Englishwoman with the odd eyes who’d been knocking around with the Rays earlier in the summer. And, if he knew Kai, probably doing a fair bit more than knocking.

Banging even, and he snorted cigar smoke out of his nose with a smile.

“That was terrible,” she said again, but the mismatched eyes were kind when she joined him on the porch. They sat in silence for a while, the only communication between them being that Andi offered her a glass of wine, which she accepted with a graceful tilt of her head.

He sent a long stream of blue smoke toward the horizon, and cocked an eye at her.

“So what are you doing in my dream?”

Yoz spent a few moments rolling a cigarette. “It’s like this,” she said, and lit it with a snap of her fingers, “this tour that Kai’s set up. I think there’s something not quite right about it.”

Andi shrugged one shoulder and took another sip of wine. “Mike thinks the same.”

“So there’s someone involved with this benighted plan that’s got some sense, then....”

His laugh was cheerful, and even Yoz had to smile in response to it. “Oh, you and he are going to get along well. He’s a miserable bastard about it as well!”

“Miserable bastard? Well pardon me for trying to keep the bloody lot of you alive for another tour,” she told him, then shook her head and turned to look at the horizon. A cloud bank was beginning to creep in, massy and dark purple against the lighter blue of the evening sky.

They were silent for a moment, then Andi flicked his cigar dimp into a nearby bush.

“Yoz - it is Yoz, isn’t it?”

“Yeah.”

“I didn’t think you spoke German.”

“I don’t.”

“But that’s what I’m speaking, and you’re answering me. In German.”

She turned to him with a smile, shuffled herself around on the porch until she had her back against one of the posts and her bare feet stretched out in front of her, crossed at the ankles, the soles grimy and grass stained where they faced Andi. 

“I’m in your dream - so everything’s being filtered through your mind. I’m hearing you in English, because I’m controlling the dream and everything that happens in it. Except your responses.”

He nodded, then shot her a sly sideways glance. “So... why are you in my dream again?”

“We really have to talk....”

~*~

By the time she blinked her eyes back into focus, safe back in the rooftop squat, dawn was beginning to struggle through the lowering cloud cover that had kept London in its gloomy embrace for the last week or so.

She tipped her head back, examined the ceiling; her mind was racing, putting together all the complicated little shards of information she’d managed to pick up so far, slotting them together until she could see a pattern starting to emerge. The shape of it wasn’t pretty, and there was still a hell of a lot of bits missing.

The who, for example.

 _Exactly_ who, anyway.

It would, she mused as she made her way to the kitchen area and flicked the switch on the kettle, have been too much to ask that the Darkness could have laid low for a bit longer. Or chosen someone _else’s_ patch to return to life on. But no....

She made herself a cup of tea, hoisted herself up onto the windowsill, and watched the day break over the city.

Time to hit the road again. Once she’d made a few plans, of course.

Yoz plotted, smoked, and drank her tea; by the time the kettle was on again she was sure she knew where to start - although she doubted that anyone was going to be particularly pleased to see her.

“So it goes,” she said into the silence, and smiled.

__

~~tbc~~


	5. Four

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Back off," she told him, mismatched eyes glittering with anger, "I've got enough on my plate without some stupid dominance squabble—but if you want to take the time, I'll dance."

_****_

Chapter Four

“So you are no closer to discovering who hunts us, then?”

Yoz scratched the back of her neck, and shot a sideways glance at the King of the Rats.

“I wouldn’t say that--”

Gill grunted, the huge boar standing close enough to her that she could smell his musky, masculine odour. “I was right. We’re wasting our time with her.”

She lit a new cigarette and huffed the smoke toward him, a quick flash of teeth in a smile when he flinched back. His sensitive nose would have been stung by the fumes, she knew - which was why she’d done it, of course.

“ _Magus_ ,” he growled, fists bunched and shoulders braced, spoiling for a fight. Yoz turned to face him, and the pair squared off at each other; it would have looked ridiculous, the massively muscled boar and the tiny figure of the Magus - except for the fact that she crackled with energy, hands lost in a buzzing mist of static that spat livid sparks when she clenched her fists.

“Back off,” she told him, and mismatched eyes glittered with anger, “I’ve got enough on my plate without some stupid dominance squabble - but if you want to take the time, I’ll dance.”

They circled, Gill with lowered head and open mouth to snarl at her, huge tusks reflecting what little light there was in this gloomy underground with a flash of razor edges and saliva. He flattened his ears, and narrowed his eyes; if a fully grown wild boar was enough to terrify even the toughest of mediaeval huntsman, this half-human behemoth was something out of one of his worst nightmares.

Yoz wasn’t daunted. She growled at him in return and raised her hands, fingers spread ready to fling the burn of her power at him.

“Enough!” bellowed the King, and Gill and the Magus were overrun with the furry grey and brown bodies of his subjects, pushing between them to force them apart. Gill roared, and Yoz heard several shrill squeals of pain as the boar expressed his displeasure at being denied a fight. She just relaxed, and concentrated on keeping her feet under her as the rats barged and shoved until she found herself once more facing the throne of bones; Gill was nowhere to be seen, although sounds of fighting drifted along the damp, echoing tunnels to reach them.

“Magus,” snarled the white rat, whiskers twitching with agitation and ears laid flat to his head with anger, “my people have taken many hurts to save you from the boar. What will I see to benefit me from this?”

She shrugged, and lit another cigarette. The energy she’d called up hadn’t totally dissipated; it surged around her, lifting the fur of any ‘shifter standing too close with a crackle of static.

“I have to leave. Today.”

The King sat up, his expression going flat. “Leave?”

“I’ve been Dreamwalking - and I know where I have to go to get to the source of the trouble. Or at least, where the source is going to be--”

Several of the other rats close to the King set up an argument, snarls of displeasure set free to twist through the gloomy spaces of the underground lair.

“You make no sense,” said the old rat.

“I guess not. But that’s what Mages do, don’t you find? I’ll be in touch.”

And with that she was gone, leaving nothing but confusion and anger in her wake.

~*~

As an old hand at subterfuge, deceit, fraud and other unpleasant but sometimes necessary skills of the Magus’ trade Yoz knew that she was being followed within thirty seconds of leaving the station. 

It wasn’t a ‘shifter. It wasn’t a human. It wasn’t any one of a dozen species of flesh and blood she could name, nor was it an ephemeral denizen of the Outer Darkness, nor a spirit or a ghost. That, of course, left only one thing; well, only one thing that she was involved with right this moment. The Universe was full of surprises, and she was quite certain that there were plenty of unknown, unpleasant things that would be jumping out at her sometime in the future.

But for now, she was being followed by a vampire.

She took half a dozen random turns, varied her pace and direction. The vampire kept pace, its cool diligence earning it some admiration, however grudging; it took real skill to stay just far enough out of range that she couldn’t pinpoint the thoughts and energy of her quiet little shadow. 

It wasn’t long before she stopped, leaned on a wall and lit a cigarette.

“I’m not going any further,” she said in a conversational tone of voice. “So you might as well come out and talk.”

A soft thump behind her made her smile. “Come on then,” she said, and cocked her head at the sullen expression James was wearing. “If it’s any consolation, you _are_ good. One of the best I’ve been followed by for ages.”

The brief look of appreciation that flashed across his face made her snort. Good or not he must still be very young - in vampiric terms - if he allowed praise from her to move him.

“I assume you know what happened back there in the rathole?”

The vampire assumed a pose of indifference. “You left them a hair away from declaring you renegade and putting a price on your head, yes. Was that really necessary?”

Yoz laughed. “Maybe yes and maybe no - Jesus, I’m starting to sound like a Weaver. I need to leave, now, tonight, and I don’t need your lot sniffing after me any more than I need the bloody furries. So do me a favour, would you?”

“What?”

“Fuck off.”

James threw back his head and laughed, the alley echoing to the vibration of his dark joy. 

Yoz lit a cigarette, and waited. Once he’d calmed himself enough to pay attention to her - little amused glances shot at her from under his fringe - she waved the smoke in a complex pattern and sighed.

“Fine. You know about the ‘shifters and you’re following me for a purpose. What is it?”

“Where are you going?”

“Not telling you.”

“Childish.”

“But effective. I’m going now.”

She turned, but James made her pause when he cleared his throat and began to speak once more. “Magus, you know you said in the past that having friends was a great handicap?”

Something in his tone and the whisper along the ends of her nerves made her feel cold. She turned, expression frozen as she regarded the smug vampire. He broadened the creamy expression of pleasure to a wide grin.

“You were right,” he said, and laughed.

~*~

He’d come out for a drink on his own, sought a quiet little bar he knew where he could listen to the chatter of people around him - normal people, with normal lives who knew nothing of music or magic - and think. Hard. Mull things over without Kai’s chatter in his ear, Dirk’s quiet worry or Dan’s moody yearning to distract him.

He loved the men he worked with - they were more like family, really - but sometimes you could get so caught up in the daily drama that it was easy to forget the larger picture... or things that were important to just you.

In this case, addiction. Or possible addiction. Not to a substance, but to a feeling; ever since he’d communed with Yoz’ room in its separate little bubble of a universe he’d wanted to do it again. Then he’d spoken to the Rosicrucian House in Harzberg, then the Gutenfels castle--

And since then, pretty much every building he’d been in. And the more he did it the easier it got. This evening, for instance; as he entered the bar he’d directed his steps along one wall, brushed his fingertips against it. With the skill he had now he’d had to do no more than pause for a moment, his mind delving to connect with the stones of the building - another reason to choose this bar. It was underground, the stones it was constructed from much older than the building above.

It had greeted him, the sleepy soul of the place astounded to touch another mind, and a human mind at that; the feeling didn’t - couldn’t - translate into words, but the warmth of the contact had made him smile. Most buildings were ridiculously happy to communicate; even the ones that weren’t were always polite.

These days he couldn’t pass a demolition site without a wince. And he’d been driving through the countryside a while ago, and spotted a derelict little cottage; he just couldn’t resist, and had driven around until he found the place, far up a rutted track with ‘Keep Out!’ signs all over it. He’d ignored them, and scrambled through the briar until he could lay a palm on the rough, ruined flank of the old place.

It was dying, rotting back into the landscape and just waiting for the bulldozers to come. It knew what was going to happen, and had accepted it; but when Henjo came and connected with it, it poured itself into him with gratitude that it wouldn’t go into the dark unremembered. 

It’s just a house, he told himself. Just stone and mortar and wood.

But it wasn’t. Nothing was only anything and this small house in the middle of nowhere had watched generations grow up and pass on, been a part of joy and disaster, seen seasons and lives and the river of time flow by.

It shared it all, pouring its experience and its heart - its soul - into Henjo’s mind, giving him the sense of having been a silent watcher throughout the long life of the little house. The grief of war and the comfort of peace, technological advances that would have stunned the original builders of the place, joy pulsing from new owners and the final sadness of the last to leave. The long slide into dereliction, human care replaced by the scuttle of small creatures living very different lives indeed within its walls.

Henjo had sat there almost all night, only the hard shivers of approaching hypothermia forcing him to realise that it was time to leave. He’d given the building a last pat, and staggered - almost blind - through the thickets that surrounded the cottage in search of his car. It had taken almost an hour of the heater blasting him with warm, stale air before he’d felt sufficiently thawed out - and returned to a human state of mind - to drive back to the road and home.

But the draw was as strong as ever. The satisfaction of touching a mind that very few others knew existed was... powerful. Like a drug, almost.

And he’d seen enough lives and careers destroyed through addiction to know that, no matter how innocent a habit may appear to be at the beginning, just about any experience that affected a person profoundly could become deadly in the end.

Which brought him here. To think about it. To try and come to a decision. Did he attempt to manage the experience, perhaps limit himself? Or did he talk to his friends, see what they thought? Or maybe even take it to the one person he really didn’t want to have to admit this to, the Magus that had nudged him toward this skill in the first place?

Henjo stared into nothing, swivelled his glass between his palms, and let his mind run in circles like a hamster on a neverending wheel.

“Is anyone sitting here?” asked a voice, although it had to ask the question several times before Henjo heard it.

“Ah, sorry?”

The newcomer half smiled, one side of his face creasing into an amused twist. 

“The bar is rather full - I was wondering if I might join you? Provided that there is nobody sitting here, of course.”

Head still full of bricks and mortar and worry and lives that ran along a scale almost incomprehensible to most people Henjo muttered something vaguely affirmative and waved his hand at the empty chair. The man gave a small bow, then took a seat; apart from the fact that he had an unusual accent and phrased his words in such a way that his first language clearly wasn’t German Henjo hadn’t noticed anything odd about him.

The building had, though, and despite the fact that he wasn’t touching any part of its stone flesh Henjo could feel the agitation build around him, a pressure not dissimilar to the feeling in the air before a bad storm. 

“I feel I should know your face,” said the man, extending his hand. Henjo stared, blinked, then gave a short laugh.

“I’m sorry, you must think me terribly rude. Henjo Richter,” and he shook hands, “I play guitar for a local band.”

“Perhaps that is where I have seen you. I am Jaan.”

No surname? Strange - but not as strange as the way the building was almost vibrating beneath his feet, trying to get his attention. He’d felt this a time or two before, as though there was some kind of collective unconscious between buildings over a certain age, and news like a human that could hear them had travelled fast. Some buildings had almost flattened him with their sheer sense of presence, and on more than one occasion he’d spent several hours leaning on walls waiting for the jumble of images to settle down. It didn’t happen very often these days, of course; his control was better, and he could tell if a building was the overwhelming type and could warn it to behave before he even made contact.

But if he just slid his chair back a bit he could brush the wall, find out what had this otherwise well-behaved example all but throwing bits of itself at him to get his attention.

He pressed his heels to the stone, leaned back--

And long, pale fingers wrapped tight around his wrist, freezing him in place as certainly as if he’d been nailed to the table.

“No need to heed the stones, Mr. Richter. They know very little... and I would rather you spoke to me first. Flesh and--” the man gave a snort of cold amusement, “well, flesh, anyway.”

“What are you?” Henjo asked, and stared into the other man’s eyes. Not human, he could see that now; not any of the races he’d encountered with Yoz, either. But whatever his visitor was, it sure as hell wasn’t friendly and he was seriously disinclined to trust it, whatever it said. And the crack about flesh - but not blood - flipped his stomach over in a most unpleasant way.

In fact, from listening to the Magus’ rants a time or two he could hazard a guess as to the racial identity of the creature that shared a table with him, and the guess made him feel very queasy indeed. No wonder the stones were so upset that he, their one true contact with the conscious life of the city, was being menaced by such a beast.

_Vampire._

~*~

“You utter, total and complete _bastard_ ,” Yoz snarled, once her voice had returned. The knowledge that while she was here making plans and scurrying around London chasing her tail her hated foe was moving toward those she’d sworn to protect--

It went beyond anger. It subsumed fury. Even rage was a mild emotion compared to the white hot frenzy that boiled through her heart and mind when she looked at the vampire, standing coolly hipshot in the dim alley and smiling at her. In fact, her hands itched to wipe that smile right off his face.

“Contemplating violence, Magus? That would be a bad idea.”

“ _Contemplating?_ Fuck that, this is a promise!”

She started toward him, crackles of energy pulled in beginning to spark along her clothes and through her hair, her adrenaline running so high she couldn’t hold it all in. One more pace and she’d smash that smile right through the back of his head--

Except he wasn’t there. He’d jumped, sailed over her to land in a light crouch on the other side of the alley, bright eyes just visible around the flank of a filthy, sagging dumpster. Yoz growled, and coiled her own body; vampires were fast, but if she focused hard enough she could follow him, no matter how quick he could jump. And then he was going to die, ripped to pieces by her bare hands for his transgression.

“My transgression? But Magus, I have done nothing.”

The fact that he was reading her mind with such ease should have warned her that she was losing her temper, but she ploughed on regardless.

“Oh please. What - you think I shouldn’t shoot the fucking messenger? Wrong. Only shooting would be way too clean for you, you piece of shit.”

“And it wouldn’t work anyway.”

“What with you being immortal and all, yeah. Immortal until I get my hands on you. Then you’re _fucked_.”

To her surprise James rose to his feet and stepped into the open, if rather rank, air of the alleyway. He spread his hands, the sweep of his leather coat whispering wide like great black wings.

“I am innocent, Magus. And besides, you could indeed kill me - but could you take us all before you fell?”

“Before I...?”

Yoz looked up, and an icy stream of realisation crept along her spine, even her whispered _oh shit_ frozen in her throat.

“I believe,” and the vampire’s voice held an edge of smugness that she would _really_ have liked to hit with a brick, “that you have on occasion commented that blind fury is unwise.”

“Oh, shut up,” she snapped, and turned on her heel to check that she was, indeed, surrounded. Head tipped back it was obvious; every rooftop was crammed, the top of every wall festooned with the dark shapes of watching vampires. They listened, they waited, they followed her every move with dark and hungry eyes. If James gave the word she had no doubt that they would fall on her; most vampires were as fond of her as she was of them, and this many would prove fatal in the end. Even for her.

The other thing she had no doubt about was that a good many of them would be quite happy to sacrifice themselves if it meant that their moonlit world was rid of her once and for all, mysterious stalker on the loose or not.

And she’d let herself get so angry - so incensed, so blind with unreasoning rage - that this many had managed to sneak up on her without her much-vaunted skill giving so much as a twitch of warning. An unforgivable mistake, and one that with a single word from the smug bastard in front of her would be the last one she would ever make.

Time to negotiate, then.

“You see, Magus, you can be wise.”

“Oh, stuff it. So now what?”

James smiled, and the hordes that hung over their heads made a soft sound of disappointment. Yoz grinned; if they thought she was going to give them the satisfaction of ripping her into tiny little bits they were sore mistaken. She was nothing if not a survivor.

“Now, Magus, we talk.”

~*~

“Mr. Richter, you wrong me.”

The vampire watched him, pale blue eyes the colour of glacier ice never moving from Henjo’s own. The creature exuded stillness, all unnecessary movement edited out of its posture - the better to watch its prey, he supposed. The building was still doing its best to catch his attention, and Henjo raised a finger to the watching vampire.

“I need to tell it I’m OK.”

Jaan hesitated, then shrugged and turned away. Henjo pushed his chair back, brushed his knuckles against the wall and had to smile at the relief that poured from the soul of the building. It wanted to know if he was alright, could it do anything, how could it help him get away?

He soothed it with a thought, asked it to calm itself, to watch over him as best it could. He would be fine.

It didn’t help that the building - still somewhat panicked about the vampire - scolded his attitude by flashing into his mind images of vampires and their prey from its own memory and that of surrounding souls. It didn’t like the bloodsucker, didn’t trust it and would have cheerfully dropped a piece of itself on the beast, were that not immensely dangerous for Henjo himself. It also showed him the location of the other four vampires that were present in the bar, and warned him that its neighbours informed it that more approached from the street above--

“Enough,” grumbled Jaan, grasped Henjo’s wrist and pulled him close to the table again. Henjo, head still awhirl from contact with the building, rubbed the wrist absently. The creature had one hell of a grip.

“So what are you going to do with me?” he asked, and finally managed to focus his eyes on the blonde man across the table. Jaan shrugged, a tiny nod in reply to Henjo picking up his cigarettes and tilting his head to see if it was alright to light one.

“For now, we wait,” said the vampire. He took one of the offered smokes and turned the lighter between two elegant fingers for a moment, then gave his head a small shake. He lit the cigarette, tipped his head back and blew a long stream of grey smoke toward the ceiling. “What becomes of you depends on somebody else.”

“Who?”

The smile was sardonic.

“Your Magus, of course.”

Henjo groaned, and covered his eyes. Oh God. Yoz! Here he was, faced with a murderous vampire and a frightened building and his safety depended on Yoz.

He was fucked.

~*~

“My people are concerned, Magus. Some of them don’t trust you.”

“Imagine that. Vampires not trusting me. Look James, we can sidestep each other all night, so why not drop the clever talk and get to the point? I’m a big girl, I can handle it.”

The vampire shrugged. “It has been decided that several of those you hold close to your heart should be taken to ensure your co-operation.”

“ _What?_ ”

She could feel the blind fury creeping up on her again, and forced it back with an effort of sheer will. She would not lose her temper, she would not give them the satisfaction of ripping her apart in this dingy little alley. No way, no how, not in this lifetime. Besides, she wanted to hear what they were up to. Anger could come later.

“It wasn’t my idea Magus, so don’t go taking it out on me.”

“ _Taken_ taken? Turned into one of you - things?”

“That’s not nice.”

“ _Fuck_ nice. And you have about ten seconds to explain before I explode and fry your arse.”

“Not completely turned - because then you would hold nothing in your heart but vengeance, true?”

“Five.”

“But bound to us. You know how it works, Yolanda--”

“Three. And yes; you have a little nibble, keep on going back and every time you feed they lose a little more of themselves to whoever has fed on them. Two.”

This was true. The old legends about vampires - and their modern movie interpretation - wasn’t totally correct. If everyone who was bitten became one, then the planet would very soon be awash with predators and no prey. It took a conscious effort of will on the vampire’s part to turn another into one of them; a bite, however, did indeed infect the victim’s system. It made them pliable, open to suggestion. Otherwise sane, sensible people would do whatever a vampire asked - told - them to do, no matter what it was. And the more often they were bitten, the stronger the hold became.

“It is to assure us that you will stick to your side of the bargain, Magus. They will not be harmed as long as you do as you have agreed.” James had assumed a smug expression, his long, lean form elegant even in the grubby alley. He knew he had the Magus precisely where he wanted her; she’d performed her part to perfection, and the encounter was running as smooth as if scripted. 

He even looked as though he was enjoying it.

Yoz drummed her fist on top of the dumpster, the rhythmic, hollow boom a tremble in the air; the watching crowd shifted in fear, worried that the noise might draw attention.

“I don’t,” she snarled, “have time,” fist beaten in time with her words, “for this. You touch one hair on their heads--”

James laughed. His fangs caught the light in a flash when he sneered, deliberately using his words to anger her. “And you’ll do what?”

“Fuck the ‘shifters, I’ll hunt every one of you slimy bastards down and I won’t stop until you’re all _staked!_ ”

Fury ran hot through her veins once more, but instead of pushing it down she shaped it, rode it. Energy coiled in her muscles, and she shifted it about until her whole body thrummed with stored energy. If she felt that she had to explode, she was going to take a hell of a lot of the watchful crowd down with her.

“Temper temper. But the great Magus reduced to a mere vampire hunter? Surely not.”

“I mean it, James,” she said, her voice a low snarl of anger.

“And how do you intend to carry out such a threat? Will the destruction of the beasts you admire so much not grieve you? How will you cope with their cries of sorrow and fear as they die?”

“I’ll handle it. I’m warning you....”

“The world may not survive.”

“The world can go to the hell it created for all I fucking care. Leave them alone!”

“Be reasonable. After everything you’ve done to us?”

Yoz thought about it for a second, the fires of utter rage tamped back down to a dull glow for a moment. James had a point; she’d never missed an opportunity to inconvenience, spoil the plans of or just plain kill any vampire that crossed her path. So in a way, the fact that several of her friends were now - right now this moment, in fact - being attacked by vampires was her fault. Chalk up another one to the great cabinet of guilt she carried around with her.

“Fine. I accept that we’ve had our... differences.”

“That has to be the greatest understatement of the new millennium, Magus,” grinned the vampire. His expression indicated that, after the initial reluctance, he was now having a quite marvellous time by seeing just how far he could push his enemy.

“Enough clever words! What will it take to persuade you bastards to believe me? I’ve given my word.”

“Your word isn’t enough.”

Yoz ground her teeth. “So I see. What is?”

James waved a hand, and one of the vampires dropped from the top of the nearest wall. It bared its teeth in a nervous grin, sidled up to him, and pressed a small packet into James’ outstretched palm. He opened the package, and showed Yoz what was inside.

She peered at it, then pulled a face.

“I didn’t know that there were any of those left.”

“This is very possibly the last. You know what it is and what it will do; it will do you no harm, and once your mission is complete it will be removed.”

“You mean I can kill it.”

James shrugged. “I don’t care what you do with it. The Council wanted to rig it so that after you had found and defeated the assassin it would kill you, but I argued that you would detect that.”

Yoz searched the mind of the smug vampire in front of her, and also the mind - what there was of it - of the spiky-looking worm that wound itself in slow, complicated loops on the chill surface of James’ hand. There was no subterfuge that she could detect; creatures like the one in front of her were incredibly rare, and hard enough to program the first time. If this one had any extra instructions, she couldn’t see them. The chances were very high indeed that James was telling the truth.

“Crap.”

She bit the inside of her cheek. It was a living transmitter, bound irreversibly to the brain and soul - or in the case of the vampires, the energy signature - of the one that had captured and programmed it. They were a fragment of a massive, intelligent civilisation that had existed on the planet several million years before humanity had evolved; they had been genetically engineering biomechanical creatures like this one while early humans had still been in the trees throwing bits of twig at each other.

Traces remained, both in the racial memories of some of the older species and in pieces like this one - but of the creators there was no sign. In the end all their cleverness couldn’t save them, and the Darkness had taken them all.

Yoz sighed.

“Fine. Leave my friends alone.”

“As soon as it is fitted the word will go out, Magus.”

She lowered her head, and exposed the back of her neck. The creature jumped from James’ hand to her skin, and she felt the protective ink that marked her tighten for a moment; a thought pushed it back, and the worm slid under her skin. It burrowed, and she fell to her knees; the pain was huge and immediate, and the Magus couldn’t hold in the cry that escaped her.

“It will pass, Magus,” murmured the vampire, and with a glance dispersed his brethren that had watched with such patience. They moved away, their disappointment palpable; many of them had hoped that the Mage would refuse, and they could attack and be rid of her once and for all.

The pain blossomed against the base of her skull, a fierce blaze of scarlet and yellow and she fell, straight into the waiting arms of the comforting dark. James cocked his head at her and smiled.

“And so it begins, Yolanda,” he said under his breath, then scooped her twitching form from the concrete and bore her away into the night.

_~~tbc~~_


	6. Five

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Valdrin just cocked his head, and blinked those enormous eyes; but as was so often the case with his species he watched, and watched—but said nothing at all.

_****_

Chapter Five

The first sensation was light, of the obnoxious sort that stabs through the eyelids and orders the retina to tell the brain that it’s time for all good daylight creatures to be up and about. It hurt, but at least it was just oh-God-it’s-morning type pain, and not oh-dear-I’m-dead-and-in-Hell type of agony. So the probability was high that she was still alive, all things considered.

Yoz blinked.

Right, so morning was a bit ambitious. In actual fact, the light slanting through the ragged excuse for curtains was that of early afternoon, the turn of the year enough to send the rays on a direct line to fry her sandy eyeballs.

She sat up, and rubbed at her face. Long night, and the memories were a little fuzzy; time for a quick mental review of events, then. She’d decided to go to the King of the rats and inform him of her decision to leave for Germany that night, and then--

The memory sandbagged her in the back of the head. James. The vampires. The damn worm! But over and above that, who had been taken and what sort of state were they in this morning? Afternoon. Whatever.

She staggered to her feet, almost falling back to the ragged pallet she called a bed with the pain that lashed across her head from the base of her skull. The worm must have spent the remnants of the night making itself comfortable; it had sent tendrils of itself through her nervous tissue, welded itself irretrievably into her system in order to read, record and report every move, thought and nuance of her actions to its master. Who was a vampire. James. Bastard.

Nails bit the counter as she went hand over hand into the small kitchen. Never mind the bloody parasite, she needed food and tea and a cigarette - not necessarily in that order - and the flashes of agony from the worm where it had to resettle itself could just fuck off. And speaking of fucked off, how had she got home? James had put the worm in her spine and she assumed she’d passed out - there being a big blank space in her memory after that - so how--

“Were it not for the intervention of the damned one whose soul is lost to the Darkness, then the Balanced One would even now be prone amidst the scattered debris of Albion’s tragic present,” said a voice, and Yoz let her head thump - gently - against the counter. She knew that voice.

“Valdrin,” she groaned.

The Weaver made its way round the opposite side of the counter and stood, huge eyes quiet and expression flat as it watched her wobble upright and fix it with a bloodshot gaze.

“James brought me home?”

Valdrin inclined his head in elegant agreement, but Yoz frowned.

“How did he get in, then? I must have still been out of it, and they have to be invited--”

The slight flush across the Weaver’s face told her everything she needed to know. Had she been feeling somewhat less delicate she would have screamed, but the thump of her headache and the sick shake of her guts necessitated a rather more calm approach. She settled for leaning over the counter and giving the creature a hard pinch on the arm in lieu of a smack in the mouth even as she hissed at it.

“You invited it? You bastard. You know I can’t keep him out now - he’s been invited once and now he can come and go as he pleases! Nothing I can do will stop him short of setting wards so strong they’ll fry him to ashes!” she turned away, wobbled her way through the process of making tea and toast, a steady stream of invective directed at her visitor from under her breath.

By the time she finished and flopped into one of the ratty armchairs she was exhausted, and did little more than glare at Valdrin while she drank her tea, ate her toast and smoked several cigarettes. The Weaver didn’t even have the good grace to look embarrassed, just assumed the usual expression of supercilious, untouchable calm.

“So,” she said at last, rolling her lighter between her fingers, tone calm and measured, “I’m going to need to speak to James about this damn worm, aren’t I?”

Valdrin said nothing, and she rose to watch the setting sun out of the grubby window. “I need to know what my limits are - because whoever programmed the fucking thing won’t have set it to just watch, that much I do know.”

She lit another cigarette, and sighed out the smoke on her words as she worked through her thoughts aloud. “From what I know about the bloody things, they not only report but they monitor as well - so if the individual being watched does something the watcher doesn’t want them to do it can register that and administer suitable punishment. Which, if I know vampires - and I do - won’t be nice. So until I find out what the individual parameters are, I can’t so much as leave the house... because the last thing I need is to get into a corner and find out that I’m not supposed to do something by my brain melting. How long until sundown?”

“As most of Humanity measure time it--”

“Valdrin,” she growled.

“-- will be approximately two hours.”

“Fuck.”

Bereft of anything more useful to do, Yoz paced the room, swore at the Weaver, and waited for the vampire to wake up and talk to her.

She wondered who had been ‘taken’, and if they were still alive.

~*~

Henjo’s cheek was stuck to something.

And, as unusual as it would seem to anyone else, the building was trying to attract his attention. As it had no hands and could not shake him by the shoulder or poke him in the head it was having to resort to the only other method it could use; it was dropping tiny pieces of plaster on him from the ceiling. Somehow it was making tiny, tiny shifts in the position of the brick arches that held up the ceiling, and the microscopic movements levered flakes of plaster away from their support to drop into his hair, on his face, and - which is what had finally woken him - into his empty beer glass with tiny, sharp little noises of brittleness on glass.

He opened one eye - the one uppermost - and blinked it at the ceiling.

 _I’m OK_ , he thought as loudly as he could, and a larger chunk of plaster fell to the table with a thunk as the building all but sighed in relief.

 _That is_ , he added to himself, _I think I’m OK...._

There was light in the bar. Not the soft, atmospheric glow of the uplighters scattered so tastefully around the walls, or even the harsh flicker of flourescents, but the brighter gleam of sunlight through a window, somewhere. So it was dawn, and past dawn, then; and he was still in the bar, and he wasn’t dead.

At least, he thought he wasn’t.

Lifting his face from the table wasn’t the most pleasant sensation he’d ever experienced. There’s nothing quite like waking up welded stickily to a damp wooden surface by a mixture of stale beer, half-dried drool and cigarette ash.

He pulled himself free, and sat up. He must, he decided, have been passed out for several hours; every muscle and joint in his body felt stiff, and complained bitterly at the enforced movement. Still, at least he was alive--

Come to think of it - _why_ was he still alive? The last thing he remembered was talking about something totally inconsequential to Jaan, all the while trying to stop the building itself from having hysterics; it had spotted more vampires approaching and wanted him to get the hell out of there while he still had legs to walk on. He hadn’t had time to figure out why - apart from the fact that if he was dead he couldn’t chat to the souls of bricks and mortar - but somewhere along the line his memory of events just... ceased. And began again five minutes ago, with a rain of particles making strange little plink-plink sounds in his empty beer glass.

He fumbled for his cigarettes, lit one and sat back. A few staff were scuttling about the place, cleaning, sweeping, making ready for the approaching evening; why hadn’t they thrown him out? After all, the other tables in the place were clean except for one other, over in the corner. In gloom. And they hadn’t put the chairs on that because it had something on it--

Henjo squinted, and wished he’d thought to bring his glasses.

Hush fell across the empty bar; must be break time for the early shift, he thought, and struggled to his feet. Once up he had to clutch at the edge of the table; ye Gods, but he felt weak! He didn’t remember having too much to drink, but then there were large parts of last night he didn’t remember at all so a hangover was always possible. Although if it was a hangover it was a totally new type, one that ran toward making him want to lie on the floor in a ball and sleep rather than the usual headbanging-stomach-twisting type.

Really, he hadn’t decided to move. All he’d wanted to do was stand up, and he reckoned he’d make a plan from there; find out what time it was, take a piss, find his way home. Try to forget vampires and the panic of ancient stone and spend a quiet night in front of the TV not thinking about anything. Even while his mind was carefully swirling the sludge of his thoughts, trying to make something coherent or clever bubble to the surface like so much marsh gas, his feet had come to a decision of their own and wandered across to the only other table still occupied. 

Because, he now saw, it was occupied; the shape he’d taken for a bundle of rags or dishcloths or something equally unprepossessing was, now he got a bit closer, a person. A person with his face stuck to the table in much the same fashion as his had been, not so long before; this person’s face was grey with apparent fatigue, and he had a huge, ugly bruise flowering under the point of his jaw. A huge ugly bruise that - when his fingers made their way up to the corresponding area on his own neck - he also shared. 

Henjo tipped his head to examine the face of the sleeper, and got another shock.

It was Markus.

~*~

Yoz didn’t have much furniture, and what she had was being reduced to splinters by her frustration. She paced, and woe betide any harmless chair or table that crossed her path. She wasn’t in the mood for anything to get in her way, not right now. 

“Shit. Shit! How long now?”

“Abusing what sparse furnishings your larcenous lifestyle has managed to procure will not increase the velocity of the turn of the curve of the planet, Magus.”

“I _know_ that,” snapped Yoz. She sucked hard on another cigarette, went back to pacing up and down the small apartment. 

“Your overwhelming emotionality, that feeling which you would, no doubt, describe as helplessness--”

“Shut up, Valdrin.”

“--were you to engage your powers of cognition in a somewhat more lateral direction, as I believe the colloquialism is expressed--”

“Shut u- laterally?”

Valdrin leaned back on the sofa, laced his fingers behind his head, and flicked the transparent nictitating membranes across his eyes. Yoz eyed him for a moment, and then the creases of worry that had marred her expression since she’d realised that she would just have to be patient and wait for the vampire to wake up smoothed out. In their place came the twist of her features into a sly smile; she ground out her cigarette under her boot, lit another one with a snap of her fingers and let out a bark of laughter.

“More than one way to skin a cat, right?”

“I believe that no mention was made of epithelially challenged felines, but that could indeed be the case in this instance.”

She began to pace again, but this was more of a dance on the tips of her toes rather than the heel-heavy stomp she had been using before. “I can’t go Dreamwalking or travelling astrally because my brain could melt, so there must be another way to contact someone. And I believe in this box over _here--_ ” she rummaged in a cardboard box behind the sofa, “ah, yes. A mobile phone! And it has a charge on it too. Surely the worm can’t object to me using that!”

The Weaver smiled, and she began to mutter under her breath. “Number. Number. Number! Yes. Perhaps if I -”

Another box stowed in the kitchen gave her a cheap crystal pendant on a tarnished chain, a scrap of paper appeared as from nowhere and Valdrin himself passed her a pen; a few moment’s work with all three and she was dialling Dirk’s number, cursing every second that he kept not picking up the phone.

~*~

Dirk was knee deep in paperwork when the phone rang. He lifted his head and glared at it; grateful as he would be for anything that might drag him out of this Hell of logistics and figures for the upcoming tour he really didn’t have time to talk to anyone right now. He turned his mobile around to view the screen; perhaps that would give him a clue as to who was calling--

His eyebrows shot up when the message on the screen read: _Answer the phone, dickhead._

It wasn’t supposed to do that.

It buzzed against the wood of his desk with even more urgency, if that were possible; the ringtone got louder, and began to really grate on his ears. The screen now said:

_I know you’re there._

Then changed to:

_Don’t make me leave you a message._

As far as he knew, only one person of his acquaintance could make electronics misbehave in such a spectacular fashion, especially at a distance. He picked it up, pinched the bridge of his nose and, with a long-suffering, heartfelt sigh, hit the green key and answered the call.

“Hello Yoz,” he said.

“Dirk! Fuck me, you let your phone ring for ages.”

He rolled his eyes, very glad that she wasn’t there to see it. “I was wondering if the screen was about to explode with any more nasty messages.”

“Don’t roll your eyes at me - and don’t sigh, either. I need a favour.”

Blocking a second sigh in his chest by dint of sheer willpower, Dirk fumbled for his cigarettes and lit one while he listened to the Magus rattle off a long list of things she needed him to do - not tomorrow, not later, not after he’d finished what he was doing, but _right fucking now_. If he wouldn’t mind.

“If I wouldn’t _mind?_ ” and his laugh was incredulous. “Yoz, what’s going on?”

There was a very pregnant pause on her end of the connection, and it was his turn to grin as he heard the whisper of a sigh.

“It’s... complicated. But I’ve been delayed by a day or two - so will you help?”

“You know I can’t say no to you, woman.”

A light laugh, and the growl that she replied with had the front of his jeans tightening in a very familiar way. “That,” she said, and lust dripped from her tone like honey, “is what I’m counting on.”

He couldn’t hold back the snort, and she laughed.

“OK, I’m sorry. But I really need you to do this for me. And then call me when you’re done, right?”

“I haven’t got your number--”

A snort. “Yeah, you have. In the memory of your phone, under ‘Magus’. Speak to you later, yes?”

And with that she was gone, the slow drill of the dial tone heavy in his ear. He held the phone away from his face and glared at it; as usual, no bloody explanation, just a list of orders. Orders that he would, also as per usual, carry out to the best of his abilities.

“I wonder if she’ll give me a biscuit for being a good doggie?” he muttered to himself, and dialled Henjo’s number.

~*~

Markus was hard work to wake up, but eventually Henjo got through to him. He was disorientated, cold; he couldn’t stop shivering, and Henjo touched the arm of one of the staff that bustled past.

“Can we get some coffee here?”

Expecting to be thrown out for being discovered in the bar when it was, technically, still closed no-one was more surprised than him when the woman just frowned, shook her head a little then complied. Within moments she was back with two large mugs, the steam rising into his face appearing to revive Markus a little. 

“What the hell,” he asked, his words more than a bit slurred, “am I doing here?”

Henjo shrugged. “Fucked if I know,” he said with a sigh, and took a swig from his mug. “How much do you remember about last night?”

Markus frowned at the table. “I was out for a drink with some friends... and got talking to this guy.”

“Who was he?”

A shrug. “Just some guy. There was some talk about going somewhere else, but I think I decided... not to?” Markus looked up, brow scrunched in a frown. “And then you shaking my shoulder. Hen, what the fuck is going on?”

Henjo bit his lip, and wondered just how much his friend could handle of the truth. He had to try telling him; at least that way if it all came back to bite them in the - ha! - neck, he could say ‘I did try to tell you...’.

“Finish your coffee and we’ll go back to my place. I’ll try and explain - but you’re not going to like it.”

The sleepy blue grey eyes drifted shut over the fragrant steam rising from the mug. “I don’t like it already.”

“Oh, trust me - it’s going to get a lot worse before it gets better.”

Henjo found that he was being watched through puffy slits, and reminded himself - again - just how easy it was to underestimate the man sitting before him. Markus often came across as slow and slightly dim, his speech calm and measured, quick to smile and even quicker with a self-deprecating quip; those small eyes missed little, however, and the mind behind them was as sharp as a razor. Add to that a great heart and a gentle soul and--

Well, there were a lot of people Henjo didn’t want to see dragged into Yoz’ neverending squabble with the entire Vampire nation, and Markus was very, very close to the top of it. Along, of course, with himself - and now that he’d been bitten, did that mean he was going to die and turn into one? How much of the old stories and the newer, Hollywood-based ones could be true? 

“Hen?” asked that slow, familiar voice, and Henjo snapped his attention back to the here and now with a shake of his head. Markus had his hand on his elbow, a concerned frown on his face. Even the building was beginning to worry again; he could feel little outgrowths of concern winding across from the walls, a light touch to his mind enquiring if all was well. That gave him an idea, and he excused himself from Markus.

Ostensibly heading for the bathroom he stopped as soon as he was out of sight, and leaned against the wall. The awareness of the soul of the place was there, the touch of its concern bringing a weary smile to Henjo’s face. Things must be bad when you found yourself grateful for the compassion of a building - but then, wasn’t that part of what he was finding so addictive, so exhilarating?

To business, however. He reassured the building that yes, he was fine, and asked it if it remembered the events of the night before. It swirled in confusion; sometimes, he’d found, it was very hard to get such old souls to think in human-sized units of time. He reminded it of the memory of his own arrival, and gave it a gentle prod. A flash of warmth, amusement - it got the point, and Henjo found himself almost overwhelmed with the sensory rush of the building’s perception of the evening before.

There he was, and Jaan; there were the other vampires, bringing someone down into the converted cellar with them. Markus, his face oddly blank, the sparkle that usually danced in the grey-blue of his eyes absent. He had to sift through the images, help the place remember just about he and Markus; right now it was giving him a tumble of sensation of memory, the buzz of a full bar, viewing each separate patron and the street outside, the houses to either side, communication and linkage and--

He focused harder and, chastened, the soul hurried to comply with his wishes. There were the vampires again, and a glance passed between Jaan and the one leading Markus; a plan confirmed, information exchanged with that one, fleeting exchange. His friend was stowed at the table Henjo had found him at, several of the predators with him and shielding him from the herd of humanity that surged and swelled around them. Henjo himself had risen to use the bathroom, and Jaan had accompanied him; watching himself from the outside like this was very strange, but thankfully he was too focused on watching the memory to worry about it.

Two more of the vampires had been waiting in the gents, and after he’d unloaded the beer he’d drunk one of them had held the door closed while Jaan and the third had grabbed him and--

He broke off from the memory for a second, breathing deep and slow to quell the nausea that shifted in his guts. Seeing yourself pinned in the arms of one vampire while another tore at the flesh of your neck like a starving wolf?

Unpleasant. At best.

All three had fed, then he had been led back to the table, his movements slow and unsteady; both men were then carefully guarded until the great mass of patrons left. Then they were both fed on once more (which made him shudder), but then were abandoned to the empty bar, staff clearing up around them as though they weren’t there. Well, he could get to the bottom of that puzzle another time - for the moment the only important thing was getting home, gathering his wits in more familiar circumstances. And helping Markus do the same. And maybe even trying to explain about vampires....

~*~

Yoz had returned to her restless pace of the room by the time James awoke, the vampire uncurling from his hiding place under a blanket in a wardrobe. He stretched, shook himself then strolled past the growling Magus to flop on the sofa next to Valdrin. Yoz swayed one step toward him, murder in her eyes; the vampire just blew her a kiss, then grinned when sudden pain drove her to her knees, her fury at his bravado triggering the worm to force her to abandon her plans for violence.

The agony was vast and overwhelming; she was blind, deafened by a roar in her ears and sucked at by a terrible darkness that plucked at her hands and feet, attempted to drag her down into blessed unconsciousness. It failed to succeed, and the next thing that she was aware of was James’ hands on her forehead and the back of her neck, the cool of his skin driving the torment back. She stayed where she was, head down, hair in her eyes, her gasps for breath harsh into the quiet of the room. He waited until her breathing had slowed, returned somewhat to normal before he spoke.

“I am sorry, Magus; that was the only way I could think of to demonstrate how unwise attacking me might be. At least this way it didn’t kill you.”

Her voice was low and rough when she replied. “Wow, thanks.”

“If you’d tried to gather magic, you would be dead.”

She curled her spine, sank to sit cross-legged. “I think you’d better tell me more about the worm and what it can do.”

“How much do you know?”

Yoz thought for a moment. “As far as I can tell - and from what I’ve read - it’s spread itself throughout my entire nervous system. Its brain, and the transmitter, are wrapped around my brain stem. Any attempt to remove it will cause it to self destruct, taking my nervous system with it. Right so far?”

The vampire nodded, his smile rather grim. She sighed and continued. “It records and transmits - but it will have been pre-programmed with a range of actions that will trigger the self-destruct. It will give a set number of warnings when these behaviours are considered or attempted - also pre-set - and if they are ignored will then go ahead and fry my brain.” James nodded, and she shook her head. “So I guess all that remains is to ask what you’ve programmed the damn thing to stop me from doing. Obviously attacking the programmer is out of the question, yeah?”

“Yes,” James replied, now seated cross-legged opposite her on the floor. Valdrin observed them both in silence from the sofa. “And I know you’re not going to like this, but you can’t make any move that might signify aggression toward any vampire.”

“Any move at all?”

“None.”

Yoz scratched her chin and regarded him, expression thoughtful. “What if I’m attacked? Am I allowed to defend myself?”

James looked away. “No. Its brain isn’t developed enough to discern the intentions of those that it isn’t attached to. All it can do is interpret what you are doing - it can recognise a vampire, but only in as far as it can stop you from doing something violent to it, although its attention is tuned in the main toward the use of magic.”

“Shit.”

“The only thing you can do in that situation is make contact with me - I can switch it off, suspend its action, even from a distance. So if you are attacked all you have to do--”

James ignored the harsh snort.

“--is contact me however you can, and I’ll turn it off for long enough that you can defend yourself. Because I’m the programmer I’ll be in constant contact with the worm - and by default, with you.”

“So you can sit in my head and watch what I’m doing.”

“In a way, yes.”

The Magus lit another cigarette and stared at the vampire, using every trick she knew to see if he was lying to her. Thus far she hadn’t picked up anything to indicate that he was being anything but truthful; her instinct to automatically disbelieve and distrust anything a vampire said warred with the pragmatism necessary to keep her alive until she could get the damn worm out. She puffed a series of smoke rings toward the ceiling to cover her agitation, then cocked her head at him, blue eye glittering. “And is there anything else I can’t do? Any magics I’m not allowed to use, any places I can’t go?”

“Going off this plane physically would be inadvisable.”

Her face fell, and James looked rather nervous. “Which means no using your room, I’m afraid.”

“Son of a _bitch_. Well, fine. So what am I supposed to do if the killer turns out to be a vampire? Your lot aren’t exactly known for their sane and stable mental conditions, you know.”

He eyed her. “It isn’t a vampire. You and I both know that.”

“Actually, we don’t. All we know is that whoever it is doesn’t behave like a typical vampire--”

A soft voice from above them interrupted what was fast descending into a bickering session. “Whilst it is, in a bizarre way, actually somewhat endearing to see the Balanced One having to endeavour to remain polite to one of her most hated enemies it is an action that is slowing down the progress of the quest considerably. Magus, have you acquired the information that will be necessary to your immediate progress?”

She glared at the vampire. “So who was ‘taken’, as you so delicately put it, and how are they? How much did you bastards damage them? Or are they just stashed somewhere, unable to think for themselves any more?”

James lifted his palms toward her, warding off her rising anger. “I have been told that they are well - and Valdrin is right. If you have to follow up your leads by heading into Europe, you’d better get moving. The murderer won’t be slowing down, that much I do know.”

Yoz scrambled to her feet, and shifted her gaze between the Weaver and the vampire. “Fuck. There I was thinking I’d be in for a nice quiet winter and you lot show up. Bloody marvellous. And now I have to hunt a murderer with one hand, metaphorically speaking, tied behind my back - and protect some friends that have also managed to find their way into this whole sorry mess.”

James shrugged. “Such is the way of the world, Magus,” said James with a shrug. Valdrin just cocked his head, and blinked those enormous eyes; but as was so often the case with his species he watched, and watched - but said nothing at all.

_~~tbc~~_


	7. Six

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The thought that one—or both—of them might just be forming an attachment that was far stronger than she wanted flicked across her mind, and she filed it under the heading 'not NOW, dammit', and promptly forgot all about it.

_****_

Chapter Six

The room was dark, and he didn’t bother to switch the light on. It was his lounge, he knew where everything was so he just made his way across it by memory and headed for the kitchen, intent on nothing more than something hot before bed. Decaff, perhaps. Then bed and--

There was somebody there.

Dirk had never considered himself to be a particularly sensitive sort; no premonitions or strange dreams, no odd coincidences or things going bump in the night. Until he’d had the demon in his head and his soul, of course. That had changed him in so many ways he didn’t like to think about it. 

Usually.

Right now, though, he was grateful for it; an almost-forgotten beast deep inside him stirred and gave a growl, sensed something amiss in the neat, ordered living space. Something that wasn’t supposed to be there. Something warm, that breathed - he could almost hear the blood flowing, and a memory of taste ghosted across his tongue.

He leaned his guitar case against the wall, and dropped into a crouch. Whatever it was wouldn’t catch him easily; he used the trick of silence that the demon had taught him, and flowed around the edge of the room. Step by soundless step he advanced, opened his senses to search the room for the intruder. He could smell them; smell and hear, and there was a hint of blood in the air--

A spark, a scrape of a lighter and Yoz checked him out him from beneath her fringe as she lit a cigarette.

“Thought you’d given up hunting people?” she said, and with a snap the darkness fell once more.

~*~

The Magus leaned against the shiny surface of a kitchen countertop, and listened to Dirk grumble at her with a rather pained expression on her face.

“...so not only do you break into my apartment, you then scare the shit out of me. Fucking hell, Yoz, you could have called - I’ve heard nothing for days! Or sent a note. Even kicked your way into my dreams, but no. You get all mysterious and--”

“Enough, mate.”

Her tone was enough to stop him, and he cocked his head at her. There was something about her tonight; she looked a little pale, a little tired. Yes, so the last time he’d seen her he was dreaming, but even so. She’d sounded a hell of a lot stronger when he’d spoken to her on the phone about Henjo and Markus - but even then he’d been aware there was more to her words than she was letting on.

He waited for more, but she’d finished speaking.

Although he busied himself making coffee he nevertheless kept his ears open. Perhaps she had just paused for dramatic effect - an attempt to freak him out with silence, force him to fill the quiet with his voice. But no, there was no heaviness to the atmosphere, no sense of waiting; all he could hear was the clatter of kitchen tools, coffeepot, the rush of running water and the hiss-bubble when he flicked the switch to bring it all to life. One heartbeat, another; the air moved cool on his skin, and if he hadn’t known for certain that he had company he would have sworn he was alone.

They stared at each other across the kitchen, and for the first time he thought she looked - small. Every other time he’d seen her, spent time with her, it had always taken him by surprise to discover how short she really was, physically; she had such an attitude, a bombastic presence that it was with something of a shock that he found he could look down at her. Now, though, she was just a tired looking woman dressed in black, heavy fringe concealing odd coloured eyes that he was used to seeing full of life. Tonight they were just brown and blue - unusual, yes, but not the shock of shifting colour and sparkle that drew him to her side with such fascinated unease.

“What is it?” he asked her, even though he expected nothing more than the usual evasive answers.

She shrugged, looked past him. “Tangled with something I should have left alone.”

“ _What?_ You? Left alone?”

His laughter fell flat, the sound of it between them like shards of broken glass on the floor. He shook his head; it felt as though the universe had shifted beneath his feet, reality taken one smart pace to the left. Here was one of the most powerful Mages in all of creation, leaning against the side in his kitchen and doing a damn good impression of dull and weary. It felt - wrong, and all his altered senses poked at his mind, and shrieks of alarm rang against his skull from the inside.

She tilted her head, a spark of life in the flat eyes. “You know what’s in town, don’t you? I know you’ve spoken to Markus and Henjo since the night they were... approached.”

“Yes. Vampires.”

“Which you still don’t - truly - believe in, do you? Despite what Henjo’s told you.”

Dirk laughed and turned to retrieve the coffee pot. He knew vampires were real, never mind how much the reasoning, rational part of his mind insisted that they were not, and never could be. Not only had the demon given him some very thorough (and unpleasant) lessons in just how different reality could be from the human norm, but he’d learned a hell of a lot from the Rosicrucians in his time spent with them, waiting for the woman before him to give them some answers. It was all real, he’d found; all the legends, all the stories, even the whispers. All real at some level, and all capable of harm; if humanity knew what a knife edge it walked nobody would ever come out from under the bed.

When he turned round to face her once more he almost dropped the pot in shock. She’d allowed her jacket to fall open, and the side of her neck was marked with several big, bloodied bruises; a gleam further down, sticky and wet, caught the illumination from his sane, sensible overhead light and told him that she hadn’t come out of her latest battle victorious. Although the fact that she was still alive suggested that she hadn’t lost, either.

Then the memory of what vampires were and what they did rose up in his mind and smacked him, hard. Maybe the reason she looked so dull was that she wasn’t alive. Perhaps that was why the alarm bells rang so harsh in his head; if she’d lost her final battle to her old enemy she’d look something as she did now--

The snort told him different. This was the Yoz of old, brash, abrasive.

“Don’t be stupid. If they’d got me like that I’d be sitting on top of the nearest tall building waiting for the sun, and the Hell with finding out what’s wrong with this damn tour.”

Body now on autopilot Dirk poured coffee, passed a mug to the Magus and waved her through to the lounge. He flopped into the armchair, and watched her lower herself to the sofa with a grunt of effort. She held herself stiffly, her posture awkward; he joined her, and made an attempt to strip the jacket back. She snarled and tried to pull the old, cracked leather across her chest but he didn’t let go and for a few seconds they sat there, a strange tableaux of unease.

In the end she gave in, allowed her body to sag against the sofa. Dirk peeled the jacket back, then cursed when he saw what she’d been hiding. No wonder she looked so dull; now he got a better look he dreaded to think how much blood she’d lost. None of the damage he could see was too fresh, either, although there was still some slow leak from the tear in her side, which explained the wetness on her shirt. Her dark jeans were crusted with the shiny black stains of dry blood, and her jacket was stiff with it; he cocked his head at her, and plucked at the bottom of her shirt. It wasn’t like Yoz to be shy, and his heart sped up a little even as he wondered just how badly she’d come off in this most recent fight. Jesus, even a whole _army_ of Darkness hadn’t done this much damage.

She still resisted, and refused to meet his gaze. He ground his teeth, glared at her; her stubbornness was ridiculous, and if she was going to refuse help then what the hell was she doing here?

“Enough, Yoz,” he snapped, and went back to the kitchen. He grabbed first aid supplies, a bowl of warm water, iodine and cotton wool from the bathroom. “Strip. I want to see the damage.”

She blinked at him, surprised.

“You’re here and you’re hurt. If you don’t want help then fuck off back to whatever rat hole you’re lurking in.”

“Feisty tonight aren’t we?” she grumbled, but he was glad to see her lean forward and begin to slide her arms from the jacket. The shirt came off, and the jeans; he kicked the pile aside, and settled beside her with the bowl between his knees. She’d stripped down to just a pair of knickers and - incongruous enough to make him smile - black tube socks with a hole in one toe. His wry smile drew one in return from her, although that vanished as soon as he began to clean the wounds in her side.

“Fucking hell, Dirk!”

“Sit still. Drink your coffee.”

The edges of the wound were still ragged, but she did no more than hiss when he began to sponge the dried blood from her skin; he kept his touch as gentle as he could, but she couldn’t hold back the shudders whenever he hit a sore spot.

And there were a lot of them.

Even under the coat of ink he could see the bruises. Whatever she’d been up to it had been rough; he ran his finger along the scaled back of one of the tattooed snakes, and wasn’t overly surprised when it moved its head to rub against the caress. She gave a snort, and eyed him over her shoulder.

“That tickles.”

“Sorry.”

By the time he’d finished she’d worked up a sweat, but the wounds were all clean. The ugly gash in her side was almost closed, which made him frown; from her position half-sprawled in his lap Yoz laughed up at him, the sound still something less than her usual harsh bark of amusement, but stronger than it had been.

“You got the crap out - and being warm and rested makes a difference, too. And they seem to like you....”

“Like me?”

Her eyes had fallen half closed, and the glitter - muted as it was - of her gaze fixed on him. “You observed once that the ink was alive - and so it is. And... it appears that contact with you strengthens it. So, it likes you.”

“But how--”

“It’s technical, mate.”

“Technical?”

“Yeah.”

They stayed like that for a moment. He ran his hands across her skin, the beat of her life, her presence beneath his palms drawing a gentle smile; the opportunity to just sprawl together in comfort like this had been few and far between, and a warmth deep in his chest began to grow when she curled a little more securely in his lap, a long sigh escaping her as she shuffled her way to a more cosy position. 

“What happened, Yoz?”

She rolled in his lap and looked up at him, her forehead creasing. “You really want to know?”

He thought about that for a second. Did he? With everything he already knew, and all the trouble that was building like static before a big storm - did he really want to find out just how much trouble she, and by extension they, were in?

Yes, he did. Partly for him and his friends and bandmates, and partly for her. 

“Tell me.”

Yoz groaned her way to her feet. “If I’m going to tell you everything I want to be curled up in bed in your arms. It was... not nice. Fuck it, for once I want to be comfortable when telling horror stories.”

Without another word he scooped her up, ignored her yelp of surprise to hold her close to his body as he walked to the bedroom. She didn’t fight him, but did chuckle all the way there; he laid her down, shed his own clothes and crept in next to her, the pair of them curled into a comfortable tangle of limbs. Once settled, he brushed a stray lock of hair back from her face and stared into her eyes, and a frown of worry creased his brow.

“Now tell me,” he growled, and she gave a quick snort.

“Fine. I knew I was being followed from the moment I set foot in Europe....”

~*~

Hamburg. Finally.

It had taken several days of hitching, bumming rides and a hell of a lot of walking to get here, but at least she hadn’t had to fly.

She’d heard no more from James, although she knew the worm had faithfully reported every move and thought to its master; the feeling was less than comfortable, but she’d become resigned to it. She’d checked in with various colonies of ‘shifters along the way, and discovered that the killer was still very much at large and as active as ever. The pattern remained constant - a series of strikes and away, nothing but confusion and chaos left in their wake. She’d only had the time for one quick trip Outside reality, when on a rest stop she’d been close enough to one of the murder sites to check if the killer had left any traces.

What she’d found had been vaguely familiar, but she’d been too preoccupied with adjusting to her silent passenger to make any significant connections. Her hunch as to who was behind it was, however, growing stronger; still no clue as to the why, though. Or how the reality changes for the tour were tied in with vampires, ‘shifters and murder on a grand scale....

She sat on top of a brick wall that surrounded a car park, and watched the world go by for a while. So far, all seemed quite normal; the city was getting on with its life, the very human thrum all around her giving no indicators of trouble. The Voodoo overlord of the city had gone underground during the war between Light and Dark, and nobody knew what had become of him - she would have been pleased about this except for the fact that there was now a power vacuum on the esoteric side of city life. And nature abhors a vacuum.

“Good hunting, Magus,” said a voice, the English heavily accented but still perfectly clear. She lit another cigarette, and eyed her new companion sideways through the cloud of blue-grey smoke she puffed out.

It was a ‘shifter, one of the Mustelid clan; unlike the ones she’d known in the UK this was one of the bigger Martens rather than the slender Polecat-type she was used to. A big male, sable coat all a-gleam in the reflected shine of car headlights, he must be top of the food chain hereabouts. She’d known that she would be contacted, although she was impressed at how soon he’d got to her; news like an itinerant Magus on a mission had clearly journeyed on swifter feet than even she’d anticipated.

But then, those that said that the only thing that travelled faster than light was gossip were not entirely wrong.

She bowed her head to the Marten in a gesture of respect, but held his gaze to ensure that he understood that she was no mere sorceress to be intimidated. Often, dealing with the shapeshifting clans was as much a matter of body language as words; their societies were far more rigid, traditional and hierarchical than any human equivalent. At least when they were in the form of their Beast, anyway.

He introduced himself as Axel, head of the local Mustelid clan and de facto leader of the ‘shifter clans in the city. As in most modern cities they were a mix of cats, rats, boars, mustelids, and foxes; the wolves, bears and more exotic big cats stuck mostly to the open countryside around the cities, and lived in a state of wary truce with their more urban relatives.

None of them, however, were very numerous these days - which made the atrocities even harder to bear. Axel took the cigarette he was offered and sat beside the Magus, puffed smoke gloomily through his whiskers and drummed his heels against the brickwork.

“There’s exactly four foxes left in the whole city, Magus. Four! And none of us know where to find them - they’ve gone to ground so deep they may never come out again. Hamburg’s fox population is effectively dead - and we’re all just waiting to see who’s going to be next.”

Yoz nodded. “That’s part of why I’m here--”

The pointed face broke into a sly smile. “And the other half would be your handsome bass player?” he said, and at her sideways glance the Marten laughed, softly. “We know all about you and Mr. Schlächter. There are many musicians in the city, and they gossip worse than old women. You should know that.”

She couldn’t help but chuckle. “This is true, I suppose. But to get back on subject - have the vampires been of any use to you in trying to find the killer?”

Axel visibly flinched, hard. “Vampires? Magus, you must be insane to even consider it. Hamburg’s vampires help none but themselves - the rats tried to warn them, but their emissary was returned in a cardboard box.” The Marten flicked his cigarette end away, toward the traffic. “A _small_ one. No, we avoid them and they avoid us, on the whole. You should perhaps be careful, though - everyone knows how you feel about them, and they might just decide to take their frustration out on you and call it piety.”

~*~

“What’s so pious about murder?” asked Dirk. Yoz snorted and settled herself into a more comfortable position on his chest.

“I destroyed their Goddess a few years ago - we’d been taking lumps out of each other for years, so in the end I finished the job. The vampires were... less than amused with me. A mere human Magus took out their ten-thousand-year-old Goddess, their wellspring and originator; to say they’ve been keeping their fangs sharp for me is a bit of an understatement.”

“Their _what?_ ”

“Goddess. It’s a long story. But so far I’d managed to avoid them...” her voice trailed off, and she heaved a great sigh.

“Until now,” Dirk added, and her nod of agreement was so slight he almost missed it.

“Yeah,” she said softly, “until now....”

~*~

She’d spent half the night mooching the streets and back alleys of the city, senses alive for any hint of interference. And what she was coming across didn’t make her happy; the city was lousy with magic. Not all of it beneficial, either. It was a prickle in the air, a tension that made the tiny hairs on the back of her neck stand straight up and her protective ink squirm under her skin. The older buildings whispered to each other, but she didn’t have the patience to decipher their slow, subsonic utterings; she had the strongest urge to just flee, get out of the city--

“Go ahead,” growled a voice. “Try it. It’s been a long time since we’ve had a good witch hunt.”

Yoz backed up. One figure, another, a third; the vampires had crept up on her, and now she was surrounded. And these weren’t of the modern sort, creatures that could pass on a well lit street for human. No, these were old-school blood predators of the very worst sort; wrinkled and bent, pointed faces and batlike ears, long fangs hanging over nonexistent lips and noses that were nothing more than a pair of slanted slits in their pale, hungry faces.

“Gents,” she said, and stepped back until she hit the alley wall. At least that way they could only come at her from the front....

A ripple sighed through the gathering, and a single figure made its way to the fore; even hunched it was well over six feet, and the stringy neck twisted this way and that as it swung its face to regard the gathered creatures. It exuded an aura of power that gave even Yoz a shiver; this creature was _old_ , and had a strength in those twisted limbs that could break her like a twig if it laid its ragged claws on her.

She had a very bad feeling about how this evening was beginning to shape up, and sent a mental howl to James via the worm. He _had_ to hear her, because when this lot attacked she was going to be so much dogmeat unless she could defend herself.

“Magus,” hissed the creature before her, and it pinned her mismatched gaze with its own. Its eyes were blank, dead white except for a tiny pinprick of dark blue pupil in the centre; it looked blind, but she could feel it weighing her up with that penetrating stare, dividing her body into the shreds and shards it would become when it loosed its army of horrors upon her.

“Now gents, I’m not here for any trouble,” she said, and winced inside at how weak that sounded. The vampire knew it, and the lipless mouth stretched into a thin smile.

“We know why you are here,” said the creature, “and we know that you are helpless.”

“Vampire gossip spreads fast, eh? Just my luck.”

It slashed one hand in front of her. “Enough. Laughing at your fate will not change it, Magus. Our people are supposed to leave you alone, let you work - work,” and it snorted, a long, thin string of spittle escaping from its mouth to drip to the concrete, “to save the beasts. They are animals. We cannot be killed by their nemesis, who or what ever it may be; only the old ones will survive, and our species will be cleansed by this holy wind--”

Yoz’ eyes widened. That was the connection, right there; she couldn’t believe she’d missed it. What had the Illuminati called themselves? _Moriah’s children._ Their great work the cleansing, holy wind of death - and the signature she had been seeing etched into the energy of the world belonged to the insane sorceress that had driven the Dark force to its near-victory. That was the link, that was the piece of the puzzle she needed. That told her who was doing it and why, and even why these particular bands.

_Vega!_

“Well, I’d love to stay and discuss this with you,” said the Mage, and slid her back sideways along the wall, “but I really think--”

They didn’t give her time to finish her sentence, just flung themselves into the attack.

~*~

“Oh God,” muttered Dirk. “You couldn’t defend yourself?”

Yoz snorted. “I had the choice between defending myself and my brain going boom, or just letting them slaughter me where I fell.”

“So what did you do?”

She grinned up at him. “I cheated.”

~*~

The first vampire that exploded into a cloud of dust was quite shocked. Each and every one of the monsters that had dived on the woman had expected her to either try and repel them with magic - and die - or to be so distracted by the fact that she couldn’t use it that they would be able to destroy her with ease.

They forgot that she was as nasty a streetfighter as she was a duelist in the more esoteric arts, and could respond as fast with feet, fists, teeth, elbows - anything - as she could with magic. And, having anticipated trouble, had taken the time to secrete a few hefty ash stakes around her person and down her boots. Just in case.

Sheer numbers would win in the end, of that there was no doubt, but for right now she was at least managing to hold them off. The worm was confused; it had been programmed to detect magical attacks on vampires, and no magic was being expended at all. Until it received further orders it was unsure, still feeling its way at interpreting the actions of the host--

Fangs tore her side and she yelped, driving her hand down to smash the skull of the beast that had bitten her. It rolled from the fray, dragged aside by more pairs of eager hands than she wanted to think about. Their enthusiasm was working in her favour at the moment; so many of them were trying to get at her, to rip and rend and tear and kill that they were in each other’s way, their bloodlust blinding them to the advantages of working together.

Even so, they were getting through and still no word from James--

A flash of fur and the vampires had more than the Magus to contend with. Which was fortunate, because that was the moment that the worm decided that stakes weren’t allowed either, and poured pain down every neural pathway it could find.

The pack of ‘shifters fought over her and for her, but all she could do was roll herself into a ball and hope that she didn’t wake up dead; the pain was crippling, and she couldn’t even try to communicate with the programmer until it stopped the torture. 

With no idea of time in her tortured brain it could have been moments or hours before she felt a gentle, clawed hand turn her over; light stabbed into her eyes and she promptly threw up, her system making violent objection to movement, light and consciousness. Guttural voices rang about her head, and with an effort of will she rolled to her knees, then lifted her head.

“Sorry,” she croaked to Axel, who was brushing at one haunch with a curl of disgust lifting his lips to display razor teeth.

A swift glance around showed her saviours, not a one of them unmarked. All were bloody and torn - as was she, but a quick internal glance showed nothing seriously amiss - and several furry lumps in the shadows that were either corpses, or very badly hurt. But none of them were looking at her - they were all watching the lead vampire, a dark and vengeful shape that clung halfway up the nearest brick wall. It spat and swore, and in her befuddled state she couldn’t follow the rattle of German.

Then it was gone, and gentle talons urged her to her feet. A small, grey-furred rat handed her bag back with a wink, although all she could manage was an exhausted nod in reply. Axel shouldered his way through, and tilted her chin up to consider the bruises and cuts to her face.

“You are alive?”

She twitched her mouth almost into a smile.

“More or less, mate. More or less.”

At that point, she passed out again.

~*~

By the time she finished the tale Dirk was trembling. That she’d come so close to obliteration--

“But I didn’t, did I?” she told him, her voice soft. “The ‘shifters sorted me out and dropped me off here - I broke in, and, well, you know the rest. But it’s left me with a fuck of a lot to think about, that’s for sure.” 

He gathered her to him and closed her up in his arms, shut his eyes and just breathed her in. She tensed when he first did it, then relaxed with a sigh; it was only Dirk, after all. And he meant her no harm - she knew that. In fact, if anything, sometimes a bit too much of just the opposite....

“Thank God,” he muttered.

“Which one?”

His laugh was soft and low, and the grin she shot him was impish. He shook his head, and kissed her; just the couple of hour’s rest in the warmth and security of his home - and his arms - appeared to have worked wonders on her physical and mental state. She winked at him.

“Well, yeah,” she said, and rolled him to his side, sliding one leg over his hip and pulling him close. “And you know what else a near-death experience usually does for me?”

“What?” he asked her with a smile, because he had a good idea what the answer would be from the way she was rubbing herself against him, her pupils expanding in the low light of the room.

“Makes me horny,” she growled, and claimed his mouth in a long, slow kiss. For a time they just concentrated on that, the intimacy of the slide of lips, caress of tongues, the exchange of breath; their hearts beat faster, blood surged through them both as they took the time to savour, to refamiliarise themselves with the reality of taste and touch and smell.

Dirk rolled her over, nibbled and licked his way down the patterned throat. She tipped her head back with a sigh; to hell with the vampires, to hell with the mission, and to hell with the worm that was - no doubt - reporting every nuance of this experience back to her watcher. Let him watch this.

Sensation curled through her body, focused on her breasts, the sensitive globes kneaded with a gentleness that belied the strength in the long, calloused fingers; one slipped down to rid her of her underwear even as lips found her nipple, warmth closing over one then the other. Gentle suction and just a touch of teeth, a tug that drew from her a gasp before he moved on, ever lower, his path marked by the ink that writhed and welcomed his attention.

Their minds forgot rationality, abandoned reason in this simple act; they twisted around each other, using everything they had ever learned from each other to tease, to stroke, to raise the level of sensation to one where neither could hold back any longer. His touch was so gentle, and he rumbled a moan deep in his chest when he found his way inside her, her thighs closed around his hips; she pulled him to her and held him as tight as she could. Legs wrapped around him, arms crossed over his back, mouths attached together; every inch of skin that they could press to the other was on fire, alive with sensation.

She needed this. She needed the abandon he could bring her, the trust that let her relax and just _feel_ the desire that coursed through them both, a join of bodies and minds that she hadn’t experienced for a very long time. 

The thought that one - or both - of them might just be forming an attachment that was far stronger than she wanted flicked across her mind, and she filed it under the heading ‘not NOW, dammit’, and promptly forgot all about it.

~*~

Half a continent away James straightened his back, blinked into the darkness of the room.

“What is it?” asked a voice, the echo of it curling rich around his ankles and sliding up his body.

“Interesting,” replied the vampire, and his fangs caught what little light there was in the room and flashed it back when he smiled.

__

~~tbc~~


	8. Seven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Vampires," said Yoz, letting herself lean against Dirk, "cannot create. They cannot create... anything, except copies of themselves. But artistically, musically... nothing. They can only destroy."

_****_

Chapter Seven

Yoz was still sound asleep beside him when the phone rang; the shrill noise scraped at his ears until he gave in, and slapped around the bedside cabinet to pick up the receiver. 

She stirred, nuzzled into his back with a mutter, and dropped immediately back into deep slumber.

“What?” Dirk slurred into the receiver, still pretty wiped out himself. He and Yoz had, after all, talked until late into the night; then showered, had a snack, and made love again - twice - before they finally gave in to exhaustion. This meant that he’d had--

“Kai! It’s nine in the morning, I’ve had four hour’s sleep! What the fuck do you want? And this had better be good.”

The voice on the other end of the line held a distinct note of strain.

“Is Yoz there?” Kai asked, and something about his tone had Dirk suddenly very awake indeed.

“Yes. Why--”

“My place, soon as you can. Both of you.”

And with that, he hung up. Dirk was left to stare between receiver and snoring Magus, and none of the thoughts that ran through his mind were comfortable ones.

~*~

Yoz was quiet for the duration of the drive to Kai’s, curled in the passenger seat of the car and nibbling on her finger nails. Dirk had tried to make conversation, but all he’d received in reply were grunts, or monosyllables; normally she wasn’t too bad in the morning, so it had to be more than mere tiredness. Although - and he canted a glance across the front of the car - she was still heavy eyed, dark rings of exhaustion smudging her skin and somewhat gaunter than he was used to. Something was vexing her, and he wasn’t sure what bothered him more; the fact that she was being haunted by some grim thought or pondering, or that she wouldn’t share it.

“Yoz?” he asked, once he’d parked the car. She’d made no move, still curled up with that blank eyed gaze out the windscreen.

He touched her, shook her a little; still nothing, the far-away expression not even registering his presence. It was just beginning to truly frighten him when she blinked, shook herself like a dog and turned to him with a wan smile.

“Too much on my mind. Sorry. Too many loose ends.”

“Loose ends?”

She shrugged, and the smile she turned to him was weak. “I’m spread too thin. There’s too much here for one Magus - even me - but I have to do it anyway.”

He considered giving her a flippant reply, but the hollow fear he saw in her eyes before she turned away from him again was just too deep. He blew out a long breath; one person he’d never thought that he’d have to be careful with was the bomb-proof Magus; still, you dealt with what life threw at you, and right now he needed her functioning.

He shook her elbow. “Come on. Let’s go see what’s upset Kai so badly.”

She nodded, still vague, and followed him from the car.

~*~

Yoz and Dirk made their way up to Kai's apartment, the Magus still in that disconnected, lost state that worried Dirk so much. If they were attacked by something nasty now, he was afraid that she would only notice as she tripped over his cold, dismembered body and not a moment before. He knocked on the door, kept one eye on the woman; she was leaned on the wall, eyes on some unknowable spot in the middle distance and lips moving without sound, apparently miles away from the here and now.

If Kai's tone indicated serious trouble, he couldn't see how she was going to be able to help.

Kai's face, when it finally appeared around the jamb, was crumpled with worry. Dirk grabbed Yoz by the elbow and dragged her through, only to release her once they were fully inside; she trundled to a halt, still not fully in the here and now, and Kai regarded her with some concern before he began to speak.

He threw a glance back over his shoulder at the guest bedroom, and shook his head.

“It's Henjo. He turned up here early this morning, muttering something about being attacked. He wouldn't let me call the police or an ambulance, but his neck...” he trailed off, looking - if that were possible - even more woebegone.

Yoz had zoned back in when Kai used the words 'Henjo' and 'neck' in the same sentence.

“Take me to him,” she said with a frown, and Kai beckoned them to follow him.

~*~

Henjo was asleep when the three of them crept into the bedroom. He was curled up under the blankets, but his rest was by no means peaceful; he muttered and shifted, whimpered when the slice of light from the hallway fell across his recumbent form. Kai glanced at Dirk, but Yoz shouldered her way through and perched on the edge of the bed. She smoothed her hand through his hair, and her voice when she spoke was softer than either man had heard before.

“Hey. C'mon Hen, wake up - it's only me, I'm not gonna hurt you. Let's take a look at you, love. Come on, turn over for me. Yes, I know it hurts--”

The man in the bed muttered and hrrumphed, but he stretched his legs out and let the blankets fall away from his upper body. Yoz didn't curse, but she did bite her lip; Dirk, on the other hand, swore under his breath. Kai just nodded, expression shadowed with gloom.

“It was like that when he turned up here,” he said quietly, as Yoz put one finger under Henjo's jaw and tilted his head.

She nodded, and beckoned both men to join her. Tipping his jaw again she showed them the ragged tears and lacerations under his chin, the terrible bruising.

“Vampire,” she said flatly, “the best thing we can do right now is expose him to sunlight.”

Kai stared at her. 

“Won't that hurt him?”

“Like a sonofabitch,” she replied, tone grim, “but we need to talk to him - and the sunlight will bring him back to consciousness.”

Henjo mumbled and squirmed, his words jumbled but the meaning clear enough; the thought of sunlight frightened him, badly. He whimpered, and Yoz soothed him like a mother with a fractious child.

“Sweetheart, it's going to be OK. It won't hurt for long, I promise. I promise. Hush now, it'll be fine....”

Still caressing Henjo's head, she signalled Kai with her eyes to move to the curtain. He hesitated, gnawed on his lip; anything that hurt Henjo was not OK with him, and he was thinking his way through the process. Yoz scowled, although her soft coaxing of Henjo never wavered. Dirk hissed between his teeth, and moved to grasp the edges of the curtains; he was rewarded with a wink, and when Yoz gave a decisive nod he ripped them open, letting in a long shaft of morning sunshine. 

Kai stepped forward, mouth open to protest--

And Henjo screamed.

~*~

Pandemonium reigned. Yoz had thrown herself forward, across the thrashing body of the screaming man; Dirk was frozen at the window, fists tangled in the curtains, wide eyed as Kai flung himself into the scrum on the bed. He was crying out, his voice hoarse as he yelled for Dirk to close the curtains - but one bark of “Don't!” from Yoz was enough to hold him in place. She must know what she was doing, and Kai was running on pure instinct.

Henjo's voice cracked, the wail high and reedy with pain. Steam rose from the abused flesh; the sunlight seared the ragged wound and forced it closed while Yoz pinned him in the shaft of sunshine, despite all his efforts to escape. 

He stopped fighting, and the three bodies lay in a heap for a while, all of them breathing hard; Henjo's head was thrown back, his long throat pale in the brightness. Eventually, Yoz began the process of disentanglement; Kai pushed himself more or less upright, and Henjo twisted himself around to sit up, expression bemused. He scratched at his chest, the dark hair in disarray against the whiteness of his skin, and shook his head at the rumpled Magus.

“What the hell are you doing here?” he asked, and she snorted at him before rubbing her fingers against his cheek in a gesture of rough affection.

“Sorting you out, pal,” she chuckled. “Now. What do you remember from last night?”

“Well...” he began, “I was going to walk across here...?”

He ran out of words, and looked at Kai with a question clear in his brown gaze. Kai hissed.

“What time?”

Henjo thought about it.

“Eight... ish?”

Shaking his head, Kai turned to Yoz. “He didn't get here until four this morning. I tried to call Dirk, but you must have been... busy.”

She snorted and looked away, and even Dirk had to smile as he leaned against the window; if it had been anyone else, the expression that flashed across her face could have been embarrassment, but Yoz? Surely not.

“Right. Well, we don't have long - the sunlight will have knocked back the influence that the vampires have, but it won't last. Henjo, do you remember anything from last night?”

He thought for a moment, then shook his head.

“OK, what about from before, any vampire contacts? Things you can't explain, strange feelings, urges?”

“Henjo always has strange urges,” muttered Kai, and his friend flipped him the finger with a scowl.

Yoz, however, was regarding the tall guitarist with a thoughtful expression. He returned it, then brightened.

“Did you bring your room with you?”

She blinked.

“Because I'd love to say hello,” he continued, and dropped his gaze to where his fingers twisted in the bedspread, “and - you know - just make contact with it again....”

To the surprise of everyone in the room, Yoz bolted to her feet and walked out. Henjo looked at his friends, and shrugged, sheepishly; Kai patted him on the shoulder, told him to stay put, then grabbed Dirk's arm and towed him out the door that Yoz had stormed through.

They found Yoz pacing Kai's lounge, a scowl firmly fixed to her face. He stalked right up to her, grabbed her arms and spun her to face him.

“What the fuck? I thought you had to talk to him?”

Yoz hissed and narrowed her eyes, but it didn't even slow Kai down.

“So you put him through that for nothing? What the fuck are you on? I brought you here to help--”

Yoz swore, and grabbed Kai's shoulders. Locked together, they snarled in each other's faces; Dirk started toward them, wondering how the hell he was going to separate them without Henjo's help, when her words stopped him cold.

“Listen, idiot. You've been in my room, yes? I know you have, and I know you're not stupid - and you're proposing to let a vampire-controlled individual in there to sort through my library, pick up any information that they can? Think about it, Kai. You think they’re scary now, you should see what they’d be capable of with access to that much information.”

He shook his head, face screwed up as he tried to sort through what she meant.

“But you said it's alive. Can't it--”

“No!” Her yell was filled with frustration, eyes angry, the blue aflame and the brown a sinkhole for the light. “No, it can't. Because it's like an animal, or a child; if you're in there, it assumes that you're a friend. And it remembers Henjo from the last time he was in there. When you were a child, were the friends of your parents good or bad?”

She barely paused before she hammered the point home. “They were neither, were they? They were just friends. And it knows him and loves him - but it wouldn't know to hide anything from him unless I told it to and _I can't go in there_.”

She stopped talking, and turned away from him with a curse. “I can't go in there,” she repeated quietly, her voice heavy with loss, and the two men exchanged glances. This was news to them.

Dirk figured it out first. “The worm,” he said, and she blew out a sharp sigh and nodded.

“Wait, wait,” said Kai, shaking his fingers at her, “what worm? What are you talking about?”

Yoz gritted her teeth. “You bring him up to date,” she said to Dirk, “while I go through there and talk to Henjo. And no, I won't be hard on him,” she added, when Kai opened his mouth to protest, “he just caught me off guard, is all. But while he's coherent I need to see just how much he knows - and the longer I leave it, the more likely it is that any vampire-placed blocks in his mind will activate and we won't find out a damn thing.”

And with that she slipped back through the bedroom door, closed it quietly behind her. Kai turned to Dirk, and folded his arms to regard him with a mouth twisted down in irritation.

“Talk,” he snapped, and Dirk began to recount everything that Yoz had told him the night before.

~*~

Henjo was sitting up, quilt tangled around his hips, long arms wrapped around his knees and a far-away, faintly puzzled expression on his face. Yoz perched on the end of the bed, reached for his cigarettes and lit one, offering him the packet with a wink. He shook himself, smiled and accepted it; the pair smoked in silence for a bit, then Henjo cocked his head at her and smiled, a faint flush of embarrassment colouring his expression.

“Sorry about your room.”

She cocked an eyebrow.

“That you can't use it. Must feel horrible. I shouldn't have mentioned it.”

The other eyebrow joined the first, and she hissed out a rooster-tail of smoke even as she watched his eyes.

“Who told you that?” she asked him, her words calm and quiet, and he frowned.

"I'm not sure," he replied, rubbed at his arms and avoided her gaze. "I just... know. Do you think someone told me?"

Yoz sighed; the man in the bed looked so bewildered, his long face solemn and those gentle brown eyes clouded with confusion. They'd all been through the wringer, one way or another; Dirk with the demon, Dan being grabbed off his own tour and tortured with Eero, and Kai ending up as a major player in the war between Illuminati and Rosicrucians. Looked like it was Henjo's turn now, and she couldn't help the creep of guilt that tickled the back of her mind; maybe if she'd never gone near them this wouldn't be happening....

And then again, maybe if she hadn't got involved the demon would have jumped to Kai and used his shine to kick-start Armageddon. So no point fretting, right?

Right.

"Henjo," she said quietly, "look at me." She raised a finger, held it vertically in front of his face; he stared at it, eyes widening when she opened her hand, holding it palm flat toward him. "Can you see the pictures?" she asked, and watched his eyes move as they traced the lines of ink graven into her palm and along her fingers, the patterns suggesting change and flow with every beat of her heart. He smiled, eyelids beginning to droop; she gave a decisive nod, swiped his cigarette from his hand before it fell to the bed and started a fire, then began to speak.

"Henjo Oliver Richter, can you hear me?"

"Yes," he murmured, tone sleepy and slow. The patterns pulsed and writhed, holding his conscious mind captive in their web of illusion. A small noise behind her never deflected her attention for a moment, or Henjo's; Dirk and Kai slipped into the bedroom and stood back, watching her in silence as she wove her magic in the bright morning sunshine.

"What time did you leave home last night?"

"Eight fifteen."

"Where were you going?"

"To Kai's house."

"Why?"

"I wanted to talk to him."

She gritted her teeth. Too slow! But to rush would be counter productive, so - patience, Yolanda. Patience. "What did you want to speak to him about?"

"A new song--" she scowled; that information was useless, "--and about the tour." Ah!

"What about the tour?"

“There’s going to be trouble.”

 _No shit._ “Tell me why, Henjo.”

He began to fidget, and she focused her attention a little more strongly, hooked her fingers over to cup his mind amongst the twisted patterns of her skin.

“Too many forces,” he said at last, and there was an unpleasant gleam in his eye that did not look as though it was his own. Kai hissed, and leaned back; to him, it seemed as though something else looked out from his friend’s eyes. “Something hunts. The Dark is being forced awake once more. And you, you,” his eyes flicked above her palm, and locked with hers, “are vulnerable. It is almost too late, Yolanda.”

And to the astonishment of everyone in the room, Henjo’s hand shot out and grabbed her by the wrist, twisted her arm in his strong fingers until she yelped and had to turn her body to avoid getting her arm broken. Henjo cocked his head, and smiled.

“Did you think that we would allow this opportunity to pass, Magus?” he said, and his voice carried an arrogant swirl of loathing within it. “You have been dragged into the open, and now your enemies ring you and pace, wait for the chance to pull you down. Many await, more than you might think.”

She rolled from the bed and backed away, rubbed her wrist and watched; her expression stayed calm, and she gestured for Kai to stay back when he would have gone to Henjo’s side.

“But--” he protested, caught between fear of possession and compassion for his closest friend.

The man in the bed cocked his head, and eyed them. “Yes, why obey her? Come sit with me.”

He patted the quilt next to him, and if the smile he directed at the trio now against the wall was intended to reassure then it failed. Kai made sure he was as far away as possible from whatever was looking out from Henjo’s face, and began to pluck with some urgency at Yoz’ sleeve.

“What is it?” he hissed, and she shrugged.

“Oh, come now Magus,” grinned Henjo, apparently enjoying himself immensely, “you do know. Why don’t you tell them?”

“As soon as you’ve withdrawn your influence. I can make sure it isn’t permanent, you know.”

He made a great show of mock-offense. “You wound me, Magus! I’m sure you can do all manner of interesting things inside this poor creature’s head. But what would be the point? You are watched from more directions than even you are aware - Hell is sharpening its knives for you. Although there is, of course, one option that would keep you safe.”

She snorted in disbelief. “Right. And that is?”

“Abandon the quest. Come to me.”

The laugh was short and bitter. “No can do, even if I didn’t think it was a stupid idea. There’s this thing in my head that’ll turn me into a vegetable if I try that.”

“Not if you come to me of your own free will, Yolanda.”

She opened her mouth, closed it again, but no sound came out. Dirk didn’t think he’d ever seen her totally lost for words before. Neither, it seemed, had whatever inhabited Henjo’s head; he flung himself back on the bed and roared with laughter.

“I have you! By the Powers, I have you!”

“Fuck off,” she snapped, some of the old gleam back in her eyes. “You have _nothing_.”

Henjo wriggled upright, and grinned at her. “Perhaps not now. But think on it, Magus; I shall leave this man now, and you can clear his poor muddled mind of my influence. But I shall be back, rest assured; can you watch him every minute of every day?”

“I can watch him well enough to keep you out.”

“All of them?” Henjo said, and chuckled when Dirk and then Kai jumped back, invisible cold fingers running up and down their spines.

“Get out,” she snapped, eyes glittering with the approaching loss of temper, and drew close to the bed. Henjo held his hands out to her.

“A little closer, Magus.”

She hesitated, and looked suspicious. “Why?”

He beckoned. She eyed him carefully, then took the extra step that brought her within his reach; Dirk cried out when her wrist was seized and she was dragged down to lie across Henjo’s lap. He pinned her, stroked the side of her face with his long fingers, the smile that he directed at her as wicked as anything any of them had ever seen. He lowered his face, nuzzled her cheek; she froze, not even breathing, and he delicately licked the side of her face.

“We shall talk again, Magus,” he murmured against her lips, and kissed her.

She knew when Henjo was alone in his head again; the lips went from demanding to uncertain, and he lifted his head away from her with a question in his eyes and a blush beginning to creep across his cheeks.

Yoz grinned.

“Welcome back Henjo,” she said, and hugged him.

~*~

“Markus, what the _hell_ is wrong with you?”

The big man looked up from where he’d been leaning against a stack of amps, eyes even sleepier than usual. Andi stalked across the practice room, fuming.

“Mm?”

Weiki hissed through his teeth, and lit himself a cigarette. The practice session was not going well; Dani and Sascha kept distracting each other, and Markus couldn’t keep his mind on what they were doing, only managing to produce the most lacklustre, dull basslines. This was not like him at all, something that Andi was currently pointing out to him very loudly indeed while he looked at the floor and slumped his shoulders in defeat.

Mind you, it wasn’t like Andi to get so bent out of shape, either; Weiki narrowed his eyes while he watched the unpleasant little scene on the other side of the room, and wondered why Andi was so on edge. 

Sascha wandered across, shaking his head. “Have you got any idea what’s going on?” he asked, voice rather plaintive. Weiki shrugged.

“Not really. But Markus had better pull himself together, or we’re going to sound like shit.”

“We won’t sound like shit,” Sascha said, shaking his head. The two men eyed their singer and bassist, now arguing furiously.

“I hope,” he added, expression forlorn.

Weiki sighed, and agreed.

~*~

Henjo now being properly awake - although still quite embarrassed to have come back to consciousness whilst in the middle of a very heated kiss with the Magus - all four of them made their way into the lounge. Dirk, Yoz and Henjo spread themselves across the furniture, while Kai trotted off to make coffee.

Yoz, lost in thought once more, found herself dragged to half-sprawl across Dirk’s lap. She cocked her head up at him and laughed; he settled her more firmly in his arms, rested his chin on the top of her head and closed his eyes.

“No more kissing Henjo,” he growled, and his tone indicated that he wasn’t entirely joking.

She tried to twist out of his grasp, but it was a half-hearted effort and he held her firm. “Now wait a minute--” she said, interrupted by Henjo before she could finish the thought.

“I didn’t do it on purpose!”

Yoz flopped back against Dirk’s chest, and glared. “And kissing me is so bad?”

“Well, no. But you’re--”

She shoved herself upright, this time successfully shaking herself free of Dirk’s grasp. “I’m what?”

He was saved from answering by Kai’s return, but she kept up the unfriendly stare while Kai dumped four mugs on the low table between the sofas.

“Stop glaring,” he said, threw himself into an armchair, “you’re making Henjo nervous. And you’re what, anyway?”

“Nothing,” said Henjo, and looked at his feet. He curled his toes into the rug, very aware of the Magus’ eyes burning a hole in the top of his head.

“So what was talking through Henjo?” asked Dirk, trying to change the subject. He nudged Yoz, offered her a cigarette before tossing the pack to Kai.

The Magus eyed all three men before sinking back into the sofa with a sigh, blowing a couple of bluish smoke rings toward the ceiling while she thought about her answer.

“Well, it didn’t feel like a vampire,” she mused, when the silence began to become edged with strain, “but I suppose it could have been. The only thing it did feel like was a--”

“Demon,” finished Dirk with a groan. Yoz rolled her head to the side and cocked an eyebrow at him.

“You felt it too?”

“I know what they feel like,” he replied, and kept his gaze firmly fixed on the window so that he didn’t have to look at anyone. Yoz hummed for a second, then sat forward and rested her elbows on her knees, began to tap her thumbs together, cigarette pinched between her lips and bouncing in time with the rhythm of her hands.

“So the vampires are dealing with demons, who may well have decided to use this - situation - to their own advantage. But I can’t do anything about that, which kind of sucks. A bit.”

“More than a bit,” said Kai with a snort, and she cocked her head at him in agreement.

“Then there’s the job I’m supposed to be doing for the shapeshifters, which has somehow got all tangled up in this stupid tour you’ve decided to do--”

“It’s not stupid!”

“Ill-advised, then. But whoever is doing the murders also seems to have an unhealthy interest in you and the other two bands, which is not only weird but should be impossible.”

Kai frowned. “Why?”

“Because Vega’s involved somewhere. Remember her? Ridiculously tall, gorgeous, more than slightly insane. Almost got the lot of us killed last year.”

Henjo shook his head. “No. It can’t be her.”

“Why not?” Kai was sitting forward now, eyes alight. Yoz shot him a sideways glance; all the pain, everything they’d been through, and he was _still_ getting all excited about any intrigue that involved magic. That could be a serious failing. Partly because she was going to thump him if he didn’t knock it off - this was serious business, and he was getting as excited as a child on Christmas morning.

“Because Yoz put a spell on her--”

“Slightly simplistic term,” grouched the Magus, and Dirk elbowed her.

“--which meant that she couldn’t come anywhere near us. So what would be the point of interfering in the tour if she can’t come within two miles of any of the five of us?”

Yoz grumbled in her throat like an unhappy dog. “I don’t know. Unless something with an awful lot of power lifted the command - like the demon I think I felt coming through Henjo. But that doesn’t make sense either,” and she jumped to her feet, began to pace the room. “Because that demon - if it was a demon, which I’m still not convinced about because vampires do like to play silly buggers where I’m involved - would have to be working through or with the vampires, because that bite was definitely not made by a demon.” She turned and faced the men, a scowl firmly fixed to her face. “But the vampires are being murdered as well as the ‘shifters, so if it’s Vega doing the murdering why would the demon help her when it’s also working through the very creatures that are being destroyed?”

They all stared at each other for a minute.

“I think I’m getting a headache,” said Kai, and Yoz flung herself back onto the sofa with a snort.

“You’re not the only one,” she said.

~*~

It was Henjo that broke the gloomy silence.

“I really need to see your room,” he said to Yoz, but she shook her head.

“Not a chance,” she replied before she finished her coffee and returned the mug to the table. “Whatever spoke through you in the bedroom took control so easily that I didn’t even feel it coming. And I can’t take the chance that it’ll do it again while you’re in there.”

“I could go with him,” said Kai, but she shook her head again.

“And do what, if it comes back? Throw him out? Punch him? Break the link? Kai, I couldn’t break that link.”

Henjo blinked at her. “But you said--”

“I lied. It’s a very bad habit of mine. No, whatever that was? I would have had to destroy your mind to get rid of it. There’s a possibility that...” her voice trailed off, and she took a moment to light a fresh cigarette, brow creased in thought. “Maybe it couldn’t get you if you were off this plane - in other words, in my room. That’s one option. The other is for you to wear my sigil - you do still have it, yes? - and for me to remain linked with you, so that my consciousness remains with you although my body remains here. But before I try that, I want to talk to James.”

“The vampire,” said Dirk, who was looking decidedly unhappy. Yoz snorted.

“Yeah. The one with the dead man’s handle on the bomb inside my head.”

“So talk to him,” Kai said, his shoulders twitching in a shrug. Yoz cursed under her breath, and blasted out another series of smoke rings, which she made chase each other around the ceiling before allowing them to dissipate.

“I would - I will - but he’s in the UK, as far as I know, and it’s daylight. So he’ll be asleep.”

“So wake him up.”

She grinned at Henjo. “No can do. When vampires are asleep, they’re dead. _Really_ dead, dead dead - they only come awake when the light no longer shines on the part of the planet they’re on. I know it seems a bit arbitrary, but there you go - nobody ever said magic had to make sense. I’ll speak to him tonight, Henjo, and let you know in the morning.”

“No,” he snapped, and the other three looked at him in surprise. He jumped to his feet, and snarled at the Magus. “No! I need to go in there, and I need to go now!”

“Henjo--”

“Christ!” he snapped, and leaned over the Magus, teeth bared, “do you know what it’s like? Do you? I have to get in there and speak to it! That’s how all this started and I--”

He broke off, stalked to the other side of the room to stare out of the window, watched the scenery outside. Silence hung in the room, heavy with astonishment; Henjo never lost his temper, not like this. But they’d all seen the wildness in his eyes, and the pain. 

Yoz stubbed out her cigarette in the ashtray, and sighed. Henjo’s shoulders rose at the sound, and he wrapped his arms around himself, rubbed his hands along them.

“I need to,” he said softly. She rose from the sofa, and joined him at the window; he didn’t move, not even when she leaned against his side and rested her head against his shoulder.

“You just need to hold on a little bit longer, OK?”

“I can’t.” His voice was little more than a whisper. Yoz nudged him with her elbow.

“Actually, you can. You’re made of pretty strong stuff, you know? And I ought to know. I watched you run under a falling mountain to save a damsel fair, remember?”

He cocked his head and looked down at her, long face clouded with misery. After a moment’s thought he nodded, and she gave him a hug round the waist. “Good man. Now. While you seem to be alone in your head,” she winked at him, which at least drew one side of his mouth up in a smile, “tell me. How is Markus coping with all this? Dirk told me he was attacked the same night you were.”

Henjo shrugged, and went back to staring out of the window. “I took him back to my place that morning, and we talked about it. I’m not sure how much he believed, but he listened; I saw him again a couple of days ago, and he doesn’t remember a thing. Not a thing. How is that possible?”

She hissed through her teeth when that mournful gaze swept across her once more, and patted Henjo’s shoulder in an attempt at comfort. “It’s a vampire thing. Him remembering didn’t serve their purpose, so they made him forget. But it bothers me - I need to know just how much of a hold they have on him.”

Henjo shrugged. “He did say he’s been having trouble with his music....”

Yoz’ reaction was far more drastic than any of them expected. She drew back, eyes wide, then turned from them all and began to pace the apartment, swearing under her breath and waving her arms. The three men watched her, puzzled; Dirk jumped up and intercepted her only when the muttering reached a crescendo and she headed for the door, grabbed her jacket and seemed to be intent on leaving.

“Hey, wait! Where are you going?”

He gripped her shoulders, and gave her a sharp shake; her eyes, which had been looking somewhere else entirely, focused on him and she slumped between his hands. “Shit. Shit! Nowhere, mate. Just have this urge to do,” and she flung her head back and let loose an exasperated huff of air, “ _something_. Preferably something violent.”

He led her back to the sofa, pushed her down and cradled her in his arms again. “What is it?”

“He may be further gone than I thought,” she said, and there was grief in her tone.

“Wait a second, wait,” said Henjo, rubbing his hands across his eyes, “what?”

“Vampires,” said Yoz, and let herself lean against Dirk’s comforting solidity, “cannot create. They cannot create... anything, except copies of themselves. But artistically, musically... nothing. They can only destroy.”

Silence hung between them as the three men thought this over.

“So Markus is a vampire?” asked Kai, and couldn’t help the shudder that crept through him when he said the words. Yoz shook her head.

“Not yet. But he might be so close that his career as a musician is over.”

“Shit,” said Kai, and none of them could think of anything to add.

__

~~tbc~~


	9. Eight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Drama queen," he said.
> 
> "You know it," she replied with a wink.

_****_

Chapter Eight

Henjo had retired to the guest room, worn out from the morning’s fretting - and magic. Dirk, Kai and Yoz remained, the long beam of sunlight wending its way across the room as the day crept on.

“Yoz?” asked Dirk, in the end.

“Yeah?”

The Magus had slumped across the end of the sofa, boneless in her relaxation, a rapidly filling ashtray balanced on her chest.

Dirk - whose position mirrored hers on the other end of the piece of furniture - lifted his head far enough to be able to crack his eyes open and stare at her, a frown marring his face. “What are we going to do?”

Without opening her eyes she put the ashtray on the floor, and heaved an enormous sigh.

“Fucked if I know,” she replied, and the mismatched eyes were weary when they blinked open and stared up at the ceiling. Kai stared at them both, and his sharp snort made Dirk jump. Yoz just rolled her head and looked at him, one eyebrow cocked and a half smile twisting her face.

“This is crazy. We’re not in any more trouble than when the whole world was going to war--”

“Well,” mused the Magus, “the magic-influenced bits of it. Which isn’t that much, really.”

“--and you’re just giving up?” he continued, ignoring her wry interruption. “No. Not possible. Not going to happen.”

He bounced to his feet and began to pace, the solid figure passing dark-light-dark in and out of the sunshine that still streamed through the window. He stopped in front of it, puffed on a cigarette nervously; his shape was outlined against the blue of the sky, and Yoz allowed her eyes to drift almost closed again. Yes, there probably was a way out of this mess; but with fresh injuries still healing, Dirk’s uncertainty, Henjo’s possible brush with a demon and the maybe-could be return of the sorceress determined to be her nemesis she’d be damned if she could figure it out right now. She was just bloody tired, and fed up with making everything work against impossible odds.

She could, of course - and she eyed the shadow thrown by Kai, standing in the sunlight as he was - just do a quiet runner and hope like hell that his shine got them through.

Dirk’s touch on her thigh disabused her of that notion. It had gone way too far for that, and she put the idea aside with a sigh.

Although it was shuffled off to a quiet corner of her mind, ready to be re-examined if things got any worse.

“So what’s our biggest problem?” Kai’s voice broke in on her thoughts, and she opened her eyes again to see him glaring at her, cigarette levelled in accusatory pose. She pointed a finger at herself and cocked an eyebrow, which made Dirk chuckle.

“Not you,” he said, with a gentle slap to her thigh, “although....”

“Although what?” asked Kai, still practically buzzing with agitation, shifting his weight from one foot to the other in his eagerness to _do_ something.

“You said that there was too much work for one Magus,” Dirk continued, then cocked his head at Kai. Yoz let her head sink back down with a thump.

“There is. Even if that Magus--”

“Is you,” finished Dirk and Kai together. She chuckled.

“Yeah. Even if it’s me.”

“So what about me?” asked Kai. “What can I do?”

She opened her blue eye and glared at him. “First, strong as you are, you’re no Magus. Second, you’re going to be _busy_. On tour, remember?”

Kai shrugged. “There’s twenty-four hours in a day, and we’re only working for two or three of them,” he said. “There’s a lot of sitting around waiting. Maybe I can use it to help - you’ve shown me a hell of a lot and I’m not stupid, you know.”

The Magus rolled her eye shut and sighed, not bothering to answer. Dirk nudged her thigh again. “And me,” he said quietly. “And Henjo.”

That got her attention. “Not Henjo,” she said, firmly. 

“Why not Henjo?”

“Because,” she snapped, pushing herself more or less upright, “you did see what happened in the bedroom, yes? He could get taken again at any moment--”

“But we’ll be together, so he’ll be safe from vampires,” persisted Kai, “and I’m sure his talents will be really useful.”

“Oh Christ, whatever,” she said. “But I’m still convinced that the key to it all is this tour. What stage are you at with planning it?”

Kai thought about it for a moment. “Almost ready. All three bands - and Dan and Eero - are here in Hamburg making final preparations, and in two days time we have the final rehearsals. Then the day after that we’re off to Munich, a night in a hotel and the first gig the night after.” He nodded at her, expression showing satisfaction that it had all come together so well at such short notice. Yoz rolled upright with a grunt.

“They’re all here in the city?”

“Yeah.”

She rose, dusted herself down and winked. “Well then. I think we should go back to your place,” said with a leer at Dirk, “and I can get some kip until it gets dark. Then I can talk to James, get some answers.”

“Then what?”

Her grin was more than a little wolfish. “Then I’m going to sniff around the other bands, see what I can see. And when you’re all together, then I’ll be able to figure out what to do next.”

“And in the meantime?” asked Kai, flinging his hands up in dismay. “Dammit, Yoz! What am I supposed to do with Henjo?”

She shrugged into her jacket, stole Dirk’s smoke out of his hand and took a drag. “Don’t let him out of your sight.”

“And what if he’s attacked?”

“I would suggest,” she said, and her expression was dark with wry humour, “that you start carrying a set of stakes around with you.”

“Yoz!”

But it was too late. When he looked again, she’d gone; Dirk shrugged, and hurried out the door to see if she was down in his car. Kai stared at the empty air in disbelief, filled now only with the whirl of dancing dust motes and the dying curls of cigarette smoke, all golden in the life-giving light of the sun.

“Shit,” he said.

~*~

Kai was still asleep when Yoz broke into his apartment the following morning. He could - once his subconscious managed to warn him that there were intruders in the house - hear Dirk’s complaints drifting through from the kitchen; the Magus sounded amused through the scrapes and clatters that indicated she was putting a fresh pot of coffee on to brew. As a burglar she at least had manners. He crawled out of bed, and wandered through to see what was going on.

“Morning,” he muttered, scratching himself through his robe. Yoz turned to him, raised an eyebrow, and snorted.

“Elegant, Hansen.”

“Fuck you,” he yawned, and propped himself in the doorway. “How did you get in? The door was locked.”

“And bolted,” added Dirk, shooting the woman a glare. She wiggled her fingers, and laughed.

“Gave it a bit of the ol’ hocus pocus, mate. Very useful when it comes to things like locks--”

“And bolts,” muttered Dirk.

“Why are you going on about the bolt? I fixed it, didn’t I?”

“It’s the principle of the thing.”

Kai shut his eyes, held up a hand to silence them and sighed through his nose. “I don’t care, as long as my door isn’t broken. Anyway, what the hell are you two doing here so early?”

Yoz passed him a mug of coffee, then gave one to Dirk. She took a moment to stick her tongue out at him before turning back to talk to Kai, ignoring the raised middle finger he flashed at her back.

“It’s ten fifteen, hardly early. But I had a nice long chat with James last night,” over her shoulder, Kai spotted Dirk’s sudden frown. He clearly wasn’t as happy as Yoz that she’d spent time communing with a vampire. “And we figured out a way to get me into my room with Henjo without the worm blowing all the connections in my brain. And yes, Dirk,” she added, rolling her head to glare at the other man, “I know. You don’t trust him, he could be setting a trap, blah blah blah.”

“It’s not blah blah blah,” he snapped in reply, the stress of worry written clear on his face, “you’re just going to do as he says and to Hell with the consequences! As usual,” he added in a grumble, dropping his glare down to the surface of his coffee. The Magus heaved another sigh, and clenched her teeth.

“How’s Henjo?” she asked into the strained silence. Kai blinked at her for a second, sleepy brain scrambling to catch up. He shook his head.

“Fine. He woke up yesterday afternoon, we took a run out for groceries then got an early night and I haven’t heard him stir. Looked in on him a couple of times. I remembered how to set some wards around the room, and they haven’t so much as twitched.”

Her eyebrows shot up. “You remembered that, huh? Well, I think I ought to go and check them. Nice work.”

Kai beamed; she looked pleased with him, and gave him a little slap on the arm as she passed.

“Mind you,” she added slyly over her shoulder, “you don’t have the skill to set anything complicated, so they would have been easy to circumvent - you’d never have felt a thing.” Her grin was wicked. “But it’s the thought that counts. Really.”

She vanished into the guest room to check on Henjo, and Kai heard Dirk snicker behind him.

“Bitch,” he grumbled, the wind having been very neatly taken out of his sails. Dirk clapped him on the shoulder.

“You have no idea,” he said.

~*~

Henjo was stirring when she entered, and rubbed a fist across his eyes when she perched on the end of his bed.

“Hey,” she said, her amusement at the childlike gesture evident in her smirk.

“Hey,” he replied with a smile, voice still gruff with sleep.

“So, you want to go visiting? I’ve got this glittery marble all ready to go--”

 _That_ woke him up. He was up, out of bed and halfway to the shower before he remembered that he slept in the nude, and then noticed that the Magus was regarding him with an expression that reminded him of a dog looking at a particularly tasty bone.

He blushed, and covered himself with his hands. Yoz snorted, and flipped her fingers at him.

“Go shower. It’s not like you’ve got anything I haven’t seen before, anyway. Although you’re a lot hairier than I expected--”

Henjo rushed off, and Yoz let herself fall across the bed and laugh.

~*~

Dirk and Kai were a little less sanguine about the process, however, and set forth on a spirited attempt to talk both parties out of it. Henjo folded his arms and tried to look stern, and Yoz just sighed and patted Dirk’s arm while she rolled her eyes.

“Look, we’ll be fine. I’ll be wearing this,” and she rummaged in a pocket of her cargo pants, fished out the silvery squirm of metal that they had last seen her wear in the Antarctic base of the Illuminati, “so I’ll be linked to Henjo. Everything’s--”

“I thought you destroyed yours?” interrupted Kai.

“The Weavers brought me another one, and told me to be more careful what I did with it. Now Henjo, where’s yours? Assuming you still have it.”

His face, which had been bright with anticipation, now fell. “I don’t have it,” he replied, “it’s at home.”

A sharp slap made them all turn to eye Dirk. He’d clapped his hands together, and looked relieved. “Well, that’s that then,” he said cheerfully. “You can’t go and that means she can’t go with you.”

Yoz cocked an eyebrow at him and took Henjo’s hand, wrapped both her short fingered hands around his. “Think about where it is,” she said, then raised her voice to speak to Kai. “And you, watch. I may be asking questions after.”

Henjo closed his eyes and thought, hard, about the last place he’d left the talisman. Yoz, eyes also closed, smiled; she took a deep breath, and Kai almost missed the swift lash of energy that she directed out of the apartment toward Henjo’s home. It rode the shape of his memory, and returned in less than a heartbeat to insinuate the object they were looking for between their clasped hands.

She unfolded his fingers, and attached the sigil around his neck. Dirk sighed; her face wore an expression he’d seen all too infrequently, one of affection bordering on tenderness, a gentle cast to her often stern features. She patted Henjo on the chest and smiled, but by the time she turned to address the other two she was as brisk and businesslike as ever.

“So,” she said, “here’s what we’ll do....”

~*~

Yoz made herself comfortable in an armchair and Henjo knelt in front of her, both of her hands clasped in his. Dirk and Kai - still unhappy about the whole business - observed from the sofa, although from the way they twitched and fidgeted with impatience it wouldn’t be long before one or both were measuring the room with their strides. 

She gave the man before her a wink, closed her eyes, and began.

Henjo had felt other things - other awarenesses - in his head before. There was the seductive call of stone, the hidden malice of the vampires, and for a very brief moment he’d been linked with Dirk, back under the ice in Antarctica, although he’d had other things on his mind at the time. This, though - this was different.

_Hello, Henjo._

He smiled. This was - strange. Not only was he hearing the words without them coming through his ears first, but he had a sense of the personality behind them, the whole woman casting a shadow of her personal identity across his.

“Strange,” he murmured, and she twitched a smile. He felt movement behind his eyes, a sense of enclosure and protection; she explained that she was putting barriers across his mind, guarding against another attack like the one that had overtaken him the morning before. No, she wasn’t certain that it would work - but how many people, she said with the mental impression of a bark of laughter, had their own magical guardian inside their head?

“Not many,” he replied.

_No shit. Right, now I’m secure, I can guide you to open the room._

This was what he’d been waiting for. Under instruction he disentangled himself from her, and rummaged through her jacket; the sense of anticipation that washed across him when his fingers closed on the cool globe of unreality that contained the pocket universe left him dizzy, gasping. He felt the Magus’ presence steady him, and nodded to the other two men that he was fine, really. A momentary aberration, nothing more.

“Where?” he asked Kai, who gave a shrug and pointed toward the guest room; anywhere behind a door would do, but that did seem more appropriate than a broom closet, or a bathroom. Henjo opened his hand, and eyed the object that nestled in his palm; the surface felt oily-smooth, frictionless against his sweaty skin. All the colours of the rainbow flashed across it, merged and danced across and through the slick matt black of its visible body, a strange intelligence all its own watching from somewhere further than the faintest galaxy, and yet closer than a heartbeat in the shadows.

_We’ll do it with you in there - otherwise we might never get the door to open. Well. We should, but getting it wrong would be a pain in the arse, correct? So. Go into the room, hold out the marble, and repeat after me...._

Of all the weird things Henjo had felt and experienced since the Magus had breezed into his life, this had to be the strangest - by a long way. The sensation of one reality folding away and another uncoiling to envelop him did things to his human-basic senses that he would never have believed possible; thankfully, he had a voice and a presence in his head that explained and soothed, kept him from panic.

That was also very odd - he never would have imagined that hearing voices would be something to be _happy_ about....

And then he opened his eyes, and the solid sense of the abstraction that was her room - of the whole universe that contained the odd little structure of space and time - hit him like a sandbag, and he laughed aloud for the delight of it.

~*~

Dirk chewed the side of his thumbnail, and watched the serene face of the Magus.

“Do you think they’re OK in there?” he asked. 

Kai closed his eyes, and explored their immediate surroundings; when he opened them again he shrugged from where he leaned on the kitchen doorframe. “Can’t feel anything so... I guess so.”

Dirk paced. Neither man had been able to remain seated once Henjo left the room, and their universe, behind; Kai had headed off to make coffee, and Dirk, well, Dirk just paced. And watched. And worried. He tried to access that part of him that the demon had brought alive, that strange sixth sense and set of abilities that sometimes flared to life with no warning; perhaps if he could reach it then he could be of use if something went wrong--

“No luck?” asked Kai, and passed him a mug of coffee, regarded him with some sympathy.

Dirk turned away.

“Ah, well,” sighed Kai, and perched on the edge of the sofa to watch the still, silent figure of the woman, “give it time.”

~*~

_Henjo, get up. It’s dusty down here._

He blinked, and realised that he was on his knees, hands pressed flat to the flagstone floor. His normal human sense of touch told him that the stone felt like just that, stone; cool and mostly smooth, the grain of the slabs no more than a tickle on his nerve endings, the cracks between them gritty with accumulated dust.

But his other senses, the ones that kicked in when he made contact with a soul of stone? No, they told him that it was warm, vibrated with life and awareness, a deep, rumbling purr of joy at the contact with his mind and his body.

He felt as though he should just close his eyes again, and lose himself in this other awareness; share its long life and its joy in being alive, its pain and its triumph. The concerns of the human world seemed very far away--

 _Hey!_ and the sense of a sharp mental slap brought him upright. _Get a grip, you lanky streak of piss! Jesus, no wonder you’re worried - you’re overreacting to it. Remember your friends, remember your music - you are_ human _, Henjo, not stone and brick and wood._

Details were a blur as he crawled to his knees, pulled himself up hand over hand along her desk and collapsed into the big leather chair behind it. He was overwhelmed, defeated and seduced and didn’t want this feeling to stop, ever. He felt her awareness reach out - an odd sensation, as though he was growing cirri behind his ears - and heard, faintly, the rattle of communication between the Magus and her protective entity.

_There. It’s a bit confused, but it should stop bellowing in your ears now._

Sure enough, the sense of self that had so flattened him from the moment the room realised who was in it had settled down to a dull background rumble, a gentle caress over his soul rather than the freight train of affection that had run him down before. He let out a long sigh, made up of an odd mixture of disappointment and relief; relief that he could actually think now, and disappointment because, well--

 _I know,_ said the awareness in his head, and he felt a wave of sympathy. _Now, I’m just going to sit here and observe while you visit, OK? But I think we’re going to need to talk about your reactions, later...._

Henjo huffed at the patient, long suffering tone of the voice in his head, nodded, and let his awareness join once more with that of Yoz’ marvellous room.

~*~

Something was trying to get in.

It had begun with a breath of cold air, a frigid draught that whispered around the edges of the room, stirred the curtains and made the curls of cigarette smoke dance.

“Dirk?” said Kai as he backed away from the window. 

“Nothing to do with me,” he replied, and stopped his moody pace around the room to look around.

The light began to fade, a curtain of grey mist descending over the outside of the window; the ethereal gyre and twist of it scraped at the frame, felt along the sill - and began to find its way through.

Kai turned to Yoz, dropped to his knees. How to get through to her, though?

Dirk stood behind her, gripped the top of the armchair with white-knuckled hands; he bared his teeth at the encroaching mist, and felt something stir deep within. Whatever was coming, however it planned to attack, he wasn’t going to give up _anything_ without a fight.

Kai took a deep breath, closed his eyes; he was going to try and reach her with his mind, something he knew how to do in principle, but had never had to actually perform - especially not under circumstances like this. He concentrated hard, and faintly heard Dirk’s voice over his head:

“Whatever you’re doing, Kai - _hurry_.”

~*~

Yoz, mind stretched between one universe and another, felt the encroachment.

Held like this there was little she could do; if she broke the link to Henjo it left him vulnerable to attack and, therefore, possibly all the knowledge accumulated in her room open to whatever wanted to take it, and yet if she didn’t withdraw back to base reality the other men could be in terrible danger.

She pushed out a slender tendril of awareness, and swore inside her head.

OK, scrub ‘could be’ - whatever it was, it was strong and it was dark and it was going to try and hurt them all. It wanted to kill and maim and destroy, then rip out her mind and use the link to do the same to Henjo and then it would have a whole other universe to draw upon for energy--

She just hoped that she could give Kai enough of a nudge in the right direction, and that she was right about Dirk.

~*~

Kai’s breathing had slowed, deepened; Dirk cursed, snapped his teeth at the mist that now poked around the edges of the room, the chill of its phantom body beginning to fill the air with dread. Deep inside, he felt the part of him touched by the demon stir, rise; this was a challenge, an attempt to hurt his friends and his lover - he didn’t know how he knew, he just did - and the beast inside could no more allow that to happen than he could jump off the top of the building and fly.

Warmth under his hands took his attention. Kai, still on his knees, had placed one hand on each of the chair’s arms and bowed his head; from his hunched and trembling figure oozed a bright gold mist that lifted and curled to form a barrier of protection around himself and the Magus. He’d seen something like this before; Yoz had battled the demon that had possessed him inside one, and had almost been killed.

He felt it push him back - no room for him inside there, obviously - but before it enclosed both figures completely he felt a brief and fleeting touch on his mind, affection and confidence, wordless support from the Magus whose mind danced between the realities.

Yoz. Well, if she thought he could manage alone out here against this whatever-it-was, she must know what she was talking about.

He walked around the chair, glowering at the mist the whole time. It had thickened, become darker; still without shape or recognisable form it paced him, the pale grey of its outer body thickening to a dense matt black mass that watched him without eyes. Its malevolence was clear, and when it drew itself up to face him he let his Beast rise up from within, and stood at bay before it.

:Stand aside: it said in his mind. :Let me take them:

He shook his head. 

“No,” he replied, and it pounced.

~*~

_Kai, Henjo,_ said Yoz into both their minds, the link growing warm with the strain of holding all three minds together. _Hang on. This could get nasty._

Henjo, sequestered in the relative comfort of Yoz’ room, looked up at the ceiling and swore. “Is there anything I can do? Any information I can get?”

The Magus thought for a second. _Check with the room,_ she said. _It may be able to guide you to the right place to find the words you need to strengthen the link._

He felt her reluctance, and cursed her. “I’m not going to do anything stupid! You think I’d just give in to any fucking idea that comes into my head?”

 _Henjo,_ and now the voice was pained, _you have no idea what might have been done to your mind. You don’t know what’s attacking us - fuck,_ I _don’t know what’s attacking us, so how would you know if it was affecting your mind or not? Now hush a minute, I need to concentrate here._

Kai could hear all this in his head, could even see Henjo as he paced the room, long fingers trailing across any available surface as he walked; it was as though he could see three screens in his head, one of his apartment, one of Henjo in the room and the other--

Well the other just held the squiggles and twists of magic, the arch and the snap of the energies he was manipulating with the help of the woman sitting before him. With the part of her mind not strung across two universes she suggested and nudged, taught him on the fly how to hold the protective barrier that was all that stood between the three of them and the dark creation that was, right at this moment, trying to rip Dirk apart. Thinking in multi-dimensional terms took up all his strength, and he couldn’t even spare the energy to worry about how his friend was holding out against their attacker outside the bubble.

Yoz could, though, and between guiding Kai and watching Henjo she observed the third man fight the darkness, and fretted in the silence of her mind.

~*~

The battle was only partly physical, the cloud of semi-solid darkness forming hard edged limbs to slap at the man before it, teeth to rip at his skin and long, burning tentacles to wrap around his chest and attempt to crush his lungs.

His body remembered violence, though. Muscles and bones responded to the challenge, remembered how to fight, how to hurt - how to kill. It wouldn’t die like a human died, though; the battle that would ultimately defeat the ravening cloud of Dark was taking place in his mind.

He could feel it as it poked through his memories, flung open doors to reveal sights and sounds and places long forgotten in its rampage through his mind. It searched - for what, he couldn’t immediately tell - and roared in fury when it found itself blocked, the memories that it could use as a weapon to cripple him with grief and fear plucked out and destroyed, those doors leading to nothing more than a blank wall.

Dirk - his breath a rasp of fear and exertion, weakened with blood loss and burgeoning panic - felt that he was fighting on two fronts. The beast in him, the part of him that the demon had taken and grown, made so strong and used to kill, battered at his mind from the dark places under his soul, desperate to escape and fight the infidel on its own terms. The Darkness sent from outside, that wanted him out of the way so that it could turn its attention to his friends, kill them and leave their bodies in shreds and their souls torn in ways that not even the demon could have imagined.

He didn’t know which was worse, and fought the damnation that threatened him either way.

 _Let it go_ , whispered a voice in his mind, and between the strain and the fear he thought he recognised it; she had whispered to him before, from so far away his human brain couldn’t even comprehend but that part of him that lurked? Oh, that knew, and it leaped for the joy of recognition. Let it go, she said. And trusting that his Magus, his lover, his friend knew what she was doing, he did.

The shackles dropped, the barriers evaporated, and with a howl that shook the building to its foundations the darkness inside of him broke free.

~*~

She could feel Kai beginning to tremble, the forces that raged outside his body and inside his head almost too much for him. Despite his power, despite his potential he was very much a novice at this game; she’d taught him well, but even so - in a situation like this, he was vulnerable.

Henjo was deep in a book that her room had, somewhat reluctantly, guided him to; he’d been spending his time explaining their situation to it, and it was about as keen to be used by demons and vampires as its mistress. He could feel the thread of mistrust in its contact with him, and had to keep wiping his eyes to clear them of angry tears. That something so pure and bright could be clouded by the enemies that surrounded them was something else he was going to get furious about...later, once the immediate danger was past.

But there was nothing in the dusty pages that he could use and through his link with the Magus he could feel the fear, and get glimpses of the fight for their souls.

Yoz had a grandstand seat. Over Kai’s bowed head she could see the battle, hear the shrieks of pain from both combatants; Dirk, it seemed, was winning, but she couldn’t tell if the man would be lost to them with the re-emergence of the beast within. Would he break down, as he had before? Or would he be able to control it this time, and shove it back in its cage when the danger was past?

It was times like this that she wished she had someone to pray to, because right now she felt that prayer was all that could save them.

~*~

The end, when it came, was quick. Dirk almost missed it, so busy was he just trying to hang on to the entity that had risen up from inside his own mind, ride it with what remained of his consciousness even though he could make no move to direct it. It just was, and it used his body and his mind to savage its enemy, tore into it until with a howl and a twist of reality that sent him spinning it vanished. Dissipated energy flared, knocked aside what few items in the room hadn’t been ravaged by the battle so far; light flooded back in, accompanied by a cold breeze through the smashed window.

Dirk fell to his knees, gasping. Now he had to fight his own mind, push the monster back under his soul and lock the door behind it; it struggled, but was so weakened from the titanic battle that it gave in, and retreated to its mental cage to lick its wounds in peace.

 _Yeah, like I need to do with the rest of me_ he thought, and collapsed in a heap to the floor, unconscious before he’d even stopped moving.

~*~

Warmth woke him, an unknown amount of time later. Warmth and affection flowing from small hands planted on the centre of his chest, the gentle heat filling his body to soothe his hurts. He shifted, sighed, and was rewarded with a throaty chuckle.

“Welcome back. I was beginning to think we’d lost you, for a minute there.”

He opened his eyes. Yes, there was his Magus, lifting her hands away from his body to rub them together, easing the sting of power from the signs that covered her skin and focused her ability. She looked tired, a grey tinge to her skin and a hollowness around her eyes that hadn’t been there before. He reached out and laid his hand on her leg; she dropped him a wink and closed her eyes with a sigh, not moving when he propped himself up on his elbows and took in the room around him.

It was chaos. Kai was on the phone, smoke in hand, chattering in rapid-fire German to someone about fixing the window and the cracks in the walls; Henjo was flopped on the sofa, cigarette clamped between his lips and staring at the ceiling, a frown on his face. Occasionally he would mutter a word or two, then lapse back into that unhappy silence once more.

Yoz helped Dirk to his feet, although she leaned on him once he was up. Looked like she needed the support as much as he did; he knew how wary she was of healing magic, mainly because it took so much out of her - and then he wondered just how badly he’d been torn up to need it.

She turned tired eyes up to his. “You were a mess, mate,” she said, “but fine now. Nice job on the - thing.”

“Thing? Yoz, what was it?”

“No idea. Well. A projection of some kind, I guess, an evil idea made solid.” She shrugged.

“Solid is the word,” interrupted Kai, “look at the damage! And Dirk. Good to see you’re OK.”

He snorted, rolled with the clap on his shoulder. Kai looked tired too; shadows under his eyes, a haunted expression that said he didn’t want to think about what had just transpired so please don’t ask. Yoz shook herself, and when she spoke there was no trace of the weariness he knew had to hover just below the surface.

“Right,” she said. “We could all do with some kip. You two are quite safe for the moment; what we did here today has been noticed, so I don’t think anyone’s going to be playing silly buggers with us tonight. If they do, one of you get in touch - Kai, still got your amulet?”

He fished under the neck of his tee shirt, and showed her the object in question. She nodded.

“And tomorrow is the last run through before the tour begins, yes?”

More agreement, and now she disentangled herself from Dirk and crossed the room to Henjo, who was ignoring all the conversation around him. She perched next to him on the sofa and took his hand.

“You and I,” she told him softly, “have to talk. Yes?”

He tried to avoid her gaze, rolled his head from side to side, shifted and muttered until she gave his hand a little shake. Then he did look at her, his expression so full of misery it even made her sigh.

“Yeah,” he agreed, and went back to his gloomy examination of the cracks in the ceiling. She rose, and faced Kai with a grimace of worry.

“Look after him, will you? This has all been a great strain, and--”

“I know what I’m doing. Go on, get some rest.”

Dirk began to pull her away, and for a while she let him; it wasn’t until they were both on their way down to his car that she spoke up, and her voice contained a note of soft reproach.

“You know that we need to talk about what happened in there, don’t you?”

He kept his back to her, shrugged.

“Because whatever that was you unleashed isn’t going to go away, you know. And if you lose control of it....”

Her voice trailed away, and they made their way back to the car in silence.

~*~

Fifteen men gathered in the room their various road crews had been using to practice putting stage sets up and taking them down, rehearsing the complicated dance that would be needed to put on a three band show without making the crowd wait for too long between sets. Several chairs were scattered around the front of the staging, and the men made themselves as comfortable as they could while they waited.

“So who are we waiting for?” asked Sascha, swinging his legs from his perch on the edge of the stage.

“Someone who needs to speak to us all,” replied Kai with a shrug, not sure how much information he should share before Yoz arrived. “She seems to think she's got some news about the tour--”

“Your teacher?” asked Weiki, raising an eyebrow.

Several snorts from around the room indicated what some of those present thought the unusual looking woman Kai had been hanging around with over the summer had been teaching him. Kai just shrugged, Dirk shook his head with a smile and Eero gave a great, gusty exhalation of worry.

“Such a big sigh,” said a new voice from beside Sascha, “not for little old me, I hope?”

Sascha yelped, almost falling from the stage in surprise. All of them would have sworn they hadn't seen anyone come into the room but there she was, cigarette between her teeth, grinning at them from her perch beside the young guitarist and appearing as though she'd been there for hours.

“Is there trouble?” asked Eero.

Yoz hopped down from the stage and wandered across to him, cupped his cheek in the palm of her hand and nodded. He sighed and leaned against Dan for comfort, eyes haunted with memories.

“Who the fuck are you--” began Tobi, before being interrupted by Andi.

“--and what do you mean, 'trouble'?”

She took her time looking at each of them in turn before returning to the stage, then propped her elbows on it and dropped Kai a wink before she cocked her head at the ones who'd spoken.

“What do you think I mean? Murder, mayhem, all the usual stuff that blows around in my wake. How much do you lot,” she waved her cigarette at the Helloween and Edguy members who fidgeted and frowned, “know about what happened earlier this year with these guys?”

Silence fell. Nobody, it appeared, wanted to bring up the spectre of the accusations. Eventually it was Weiki who broke the thick quiet.

“Kai and Dirk were accused of murder, Henjo with helping them escape.” He shrugged. “So the reports said, anyway. They were cleared,” he added, unnecessarily.

“Indeed they were,” she said, expression now thoughtful as she considered the group, “but there was rather more to it than that. Listen--”

And she began to tell them the tale, paced the room as she described the titanic struggle between the forces of Darkness and Light that had clashed in Antarctica in the summer. She told them of the murders, the attacks, the escapades that had almost cost them their lives several times over; Eero buried his face in Dan's shoulder at the retelling of the kidnap and torture that had been intended to draw Yoz and the others out of hiding, Kai looked at his boots when she described the Vespertillo and Dirk walked away from them all when she told of the terrible fate of the leader of the centaurs. She finished with reminding them of their horror when they'd discovered that Vega had indeed survived, and had found her way to several Helloween gigs; Sascha had encountered the giant sorceress several times, although Yoz had been unable to track her and the trail had, ultimately, run cold.

“So there we are,” said Yoz, back to sitting on the edge of the stage, “and what I find most interesting is the fact that not all of you disbelieve it.”

Jens, leaning on the wall and wearing an expression of extreme incredulity, snorted. “You're full of shit,” he muttered.

Dirk and Eggi agreed, but Felix and Tobi exchanged a long look; the drummer eventually just lifted his shoulders in a shrug and turned to look into the middle distance, arms folded.

“It's nonsense,” added Weiki, lighting another cigarette, “a fairy tale.”

Sascha snorted loudly, agreeing.

Yoz cocked her head at Markus, wondered if his brush with the vampires had left him any knowledge at all. “Well? You haven't said a word.”

He shrugged. “I think...that there is more to you than meets the eye,” he said, keeping the steady blue grey of his gaze fixed on her. She gave him a small bow - she was right, there must be a flicker of awareness there - then jumped down to join her Dirk, leaning against his comforting solidity while she watched the distrust and unease of the others.

“Why are you telling us all this?” asked Andi, breaking the uncomfortable silence that had followed Markus' words.

“Because I think I've found out why reality was changed to allow this tour to go ahead. I can't link it to the murders of the shapeshifters as yet, but they are linked, of that I have no doubt--”

A hubbub broke out when she used the dread word ‘murder’, and she let the agitation swirl for a few minutes, eyed the small crowd that had gathered around her. She began to pace, stopped in front of Jens.

“You think I'm crazy, and so do you,” she said, swinging to point at Edguy's Dirk, then turning back to Eggi, “but you not so much. Interesting. Why?”

“What does it matter?” asked Tobi, folded arms and frown firmly in place.

“I'll get to it. Come on, Tobias - damn, what is it with you lot and repetitive names? Two Tobias’s, two Dirks - why are you hanging on the edge of belief?”

“She talks pretty,” murmured Weiki, and Yoz flipped him the finger.

“There are things,” said Eggi, slowly, “that...people don't believe in. But they're real.”

The Mage's eyes sparkled, and she patted him on the shoulder before she strode across to stare at the centre of Sascha's chest, tilted her head up to look him in the eye and bare her teeth in a grin. The light of battle was in her eyes, and her blood was up; attention focused on her audience she was having a rare old time.

“But you, you're in the 'that woman is nuts' camp, right?”

“I think we should leave,” said Sascha, his voice lowered to a growl the others didn’t hear very often, “now.”

“Interesting attitude,” she said, wagged a finger at him then walked right past Dani, dropped him a wink on the way. Kai nudged Dirk with his elbow, watching as Yoz moved from person to person, demanding to know why they did or did not believe the astounding story she'd just told.

“Why is she doing this?” he asked him, and Dirk shrugged.

“I think she's enjoying herself,” he said with a sigh. “She’s feeling better, she has a plan and she has people to torture - yeah, I think she’s loving it.”

“That's it,” muttered Kai, “enough.”

Yoz was still haranguing the others, waving her hands and snapping her teeth as she insisted they told her why they felt the way they did; Kai grabbed her elbow and led her to the centre of the room. He gave her a shake, and spun her to face him.

“Yoz, enough. Why are you doing this?”

“I need more information. This tour is--”

“There is nothing wrong with the damn tour!”

“Says who?”

“I do!”

The others exchanged glances and raised eyebrows, drew back to leave the arguing pair alone in the centre of the room. Dirk and Henjo sidled around to their usual places when the Magus and Kai got into one of their discussions; one behind each combatant, ready to grab them once they passed beyond verbal sparring and jumped on each other.

“You've got the power, Kai, but you don't have the skill. I'm telling you--”

“Nobody's lied to us, Yoz. It's all just come together--”

“Bullshit. Reality itself has been changed just to allow you lot,” and her wave of her cigarette included all the watchers, “to go play around Europe and I want to know why. Changing reality is hard work.”

“Oh please,” snapped Kai, getting angry now. “You think I wouldn't notice the whole of reality being changed?”

“No you bloody well wouldn't! You're still a child at this game, Kai--”

They had progressed to shouting and Tobi sidled up to Dirk, who was watching the escalating argument with narrowed eyes and muscles coiled to jump. He’d have a split second to move, or the gathering of friends would be treated to the sight of Yoz and Kai scuffling across the floor, doing their best to maim each other. It was not a pretty sight, and took hours to sort out; Yoz tended to get a little enthusiastic, and they needed Kai whole and healthy if they were going to hit the road on time.

“What's going on?”

Dirk sighed, and rubbed a hand across his eyes before looking down at the agitated young man. “They'll shout for a bit, then they'll either start hitting each other or she'll do something spectacular.”

“Spectacular...how?”

He sighed. “Spectacular. Trust me on this.”

Tobi blinked at him.

“Although hopefully she'll remember not to damage too many innocent bystanders....”

“ _What?_ ”

“She can get a bit carried away when Kai irritates her.”

Yoz had progressed to speaking through gritted teeth. “Eggi's side project, with Felix? Fell through because the singer was sick - and he got sick because he shook hands with a guy who hadn't washed 'em after taking a crap.”

“What's that got to do--”

“Because _before_ the guy did wash his hands and nobody got sick.”

“Right, like that's got anything to do with the record company--”

“Listen. Are you listening to me? The record guy's daughter was happy because her cat came home - because before it didn't, and she cried and he was in a bad mood thus no money for a tour. Every fucking thing that could have gone wrong got fixed. Do you understand that? Or should I use smaller words?”

“Any moment now,” said Dirk, with a nod at Henjo. Both men edged a little closer.

“You've gone over the edge,” snapped Kai, stepping in to the Magus, “whatever the truth there is no link between this tour and any murders!”

“Yes, there is.”

“Oh, fuck off. There isn't. We're just musicians!”

“Yeah, course you are. You've got enough power to blow a hole clear through the planet, Henjo can talk to buildings and Dirk's had a demon in his head. Normal musicians you ain't.”

“Yeah, but --”

“As for this lot, well, that's when I found the connection.”

Dirk heard Tobi swear under his breath, then the sound of feet headed for the nearest exit. Doors slammed and locked, and Yoz grinned in Kai's face.

Kai snorted. “So come on - what's the deal?”

“This,” said Yoz, flicked her hands out to the sides and sent a coruscating wave of power out to bounce from the walls of the room; it raised the hairs on the back of Kai's neck with its heat as it lashed through his system.

Tobi, Felix and Dani fell to the floor, howls of pain reflected from the concrete walls, amplified beyond belief which sent the others into a shouting, swirling mass of confusion and horror.

Kai cocked an eyebrow at her.

“Drama queen,” he said.

She grinned around her cigarette, as relaxed now as any of them had ever seen her - although the wicked shine still played in her eyes. “You know it,” she replied with a wink.

__

~~tbc~~


	10. Nine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Silence between the two of them for a moment, and when Yoz broke it her tone was almost gentle. "Must have been scary for him, then. Normal human reaction, though."

_****_

Chapter Nine

She paced around the room, gaze fixed on the mewling lump of shifting flesh and pain that huddled under the wreckage of Tobi's clothes. Whatever he was trying to turn into he wasn't having a lot of luck; he squealed and thrashed, limbs bent and stretched like rubber as waxen flesh flowed to a different form while she watched.

“Stop fighting it,” she said under her breath, and sank to one knee next to him.

“The fuck have you done?” yelled Andi, knelt on the floor next to his friend. Dani was in as much pain as the other two, bubbling agony through facial bones that bent and flexed under the roar of whatever forces had his body in their infernal grip. Yoz ignored him, and ran the palm of her hand across the shiny wet surface that shivered in a damp heap before her.

Dirk - taking stock of the reactions around him, which went from anger through surprise to stark, outright terror - crouched next to Yoz, and touched her shoulder with some trepidation. The last thing he needed was a startled Magus to lash out at the nearest person - which would, of course, be him. She covered his hand with her own and patted it, absently.

“What are you doing?” he asked her, kept his voice low so as not to startle or excite her. Somehow, when she was like this his body had a tendency to act around her as it would around any other dangerous animal - slow, careful movements, nothing that could be interpreted as a threat. She appeared to be fascinated by the suffering before her; tilting her head, the light flashed in reflection from her blue eye, the brown shaded to black with the force of her attention.

“Isn't it amazing,” she said softly, “this transformation of something into... something else?”

He sat back on his heels and stared at her, astonished. The sheer lack of compassion for the pain being experienced by the individual that writhed and cried in front of them stunned him. He knew that she was hardly a bleeding heart when it came to the pain of others, but this seemed extraordinarily vicious even for Yoz.

As though his thoughts had touched her - which they probably had, he mused, being as his shock was right at the front of his mind - she shook herself and leaned back. 

“Yeah, well. Maybe this will help,” she said, and spread her fingers over the unrecognisable lump of flesh, murmured a word under her breath. It seemed to work; the transformation smoothed, limbs and hair and muscle and flesh settled into a more regular configuration even while he watched. She looked up, pointed at each of the other two twitching heaps to send the same magics their way, then rose to her feet and waited.

Only Andi and Dirk remained near the centre of the room with her, all the other men having made their way to the furthest point away from both the Magus and the three transforming creatures that were their friends. Sascha's eyes appeared to be on the point of falling out of his head, he had them open so wide; the other Dirk, Eggi and Jens had huddled near the door, staring back over their shoulders while they tried to force the lock. She looked up at them and narrowed her eyes.

“Gentlemen,” she said, and shaking their heads they sidled a little closer, giving up the escape attempt once they realised that they had been busted.

Kai swore under his breath, and she snorted. “Yeah,” she said, and strode back to where Tobi was curled in a shivering heap under his discarded, torn clothes. “You wanted to know why I think this tour and the murders are linked? This,” and she grabbed Tobi by the scruff of his neck, dragged him forward and dropped him at Kai's feet as the beast snarled and hissed through his whiskers at her, “is why.”

They stared at the enormous cat crouched in front of Kai, ears flattened and whiskers twitching. He lashed his tail and growled, seemed to be getting his bearings now that the painful transformation was finished; Kai took a step back, huffed his surprise when his shoulderblades hit the wall. Yoz moved to the other side of the hall, seized Felix and dragged him across before she made for Dani.

The huge rat arched his back and snarled at her, blood staining his jaws where he'd bitten himself in his pained frenzy. Andi crouched, extended a hand to the giant, savage animal; the Magus just folded her arms, raised an eyebrow and tapped the toe of her boot in an impatient, staccato tattoo on the concrete floor.

“Don't force my hand, Dani,” she snapped, and with a roll of his dark eyes at Andi he stepped across to her side, accompanied her back to where the two cats circled and growled their confusion. They fixed wide green eyes on him, then crouched with paired snarls; he arched his back again, bristled the shaggy grey fur along his spine and lashed his heavy, scaly tail, raised himself on the very tips of razor clawed toes and snarled back at them, just as angry as they.

Yoz stepped between them and aimed a kick at Tobi, which he sidestepped neatly.

“Enough! Now then, gents,” she said with a beatific smile, “ _now_ do you see what I've been getting at?”

Silence, and she rolled her eyes. 

“Fine. Well, obviously none of the Rays knew about this,” and she spared a glance at Eero, almost hidden behind Dan in his terror, “but some of the rest of you did, didn't you?”

“So?” snapped Andi, stepping up behind Dani. The rat sat back on his haunches, and shot an almost guilty look up at his friend.

“You knew?” said Sascha, unable to take his eyes from the changed form of his friend. Dani shuffled his feet and looked away, ears flat to his head.

“Yeah,” said Andi, resting his hand between Dani's ears, a soft growl in reply to the caress.

“Markus and I knew there was... something different about him,” said Weiki with a shrug, a tremble in his hands as he lit a fresh cigarette, “but we thought he would come and tell us when he was ready.”

“Didn't think it was anything like this, mind you,” added Markus, taking the cigarette packet from Weiki and lighting one for himself, his own fingers none too steady.

“Learn something new every day,” said Yoz with a grin at Sascha, then turned her attention to the Edguys. “I know Eggi knew....”

“Never seen it, though,” whispered the wide eyed bassist while he watched the two feline forms pace the centre of the hall. The size of cougars but with a body shape closer to that of a lynx the pair of cats swung their heads and marked out a tight track around the feet of the Magus, lashed their long tails and laid their tufted ears against their heads, eyes uncertain as they watched the reaction of those around them.

“Can they talk?” asked Dirk, and she smiled up at him.

“I can,” growled Dani, the words slow and hard to understand, crushed as they were through an utterly inhuman vocal apparatus, “but...not easy. They,” he added, waving his snout at the cats, “cannot.”

Tobi yowled, and Yoz laughed at him.

“You look like someone in your line dallied with a housecat, my friend.”

He snarled and the changed form of Felix turned away, licked at a paw to hide his amusement. Dani didn’t bother, bared huge sharp teeth in a wicked grin. 

Dirk took another look at the cat closest to them, Tobi’s feline green eyes narrowed at the Magus who seemed to be finding his response to her comment very amusing indeed. Now that the initial shock of seeing the animal forms had passed he could begin to appreciate details; and although Felix was entirely what you might expect for such a creature - a soft, almost russet brown colour on top, white underneath, a black stripe down his spine which became rings around his tail, a white spot on the end of it - Tobi’s colouring was rather more...domestic. He was black from nose to tail, with the exception of a white patch on his chest, white front paws and a small white tip to the end of his tail. He looked - were it not for the fact that he was clearly big enough to be dangerous - like the sort of creature one sees advertising catfood.

Dirk grinned.

“Why have you done this?” asked Kai, who still stared. Yoz shrugged.

“When I tell you that you’re in danger I expect you - of all people, Kai - to realise that I’m not going to say something like that without reason. And even after I’d explained the murders to you in detail you wondered why any of it applied to you - and this was the best way to show you. Because they sure as hell weren’t going to show you themselves. And there’s so much going on right now you need to understand every bit of it.”

Felix had one black tipped ear turned back, focusing on her voice. Tobi was twisting his body, apparently trying to do something; Dani snorted through his whiskers, and Yoz bared her teeth when she smiled.

“What’s he doing?” asked Jens, edging forward.

“Trying to change back,” she said, the amusement taking on a vicious edge, “and he can’t.”

“Why not?” asked Dirk.

“Because she,” said Dani slowly, “will not let us.”

Andi’s head shot up, and he scowled at the Magus. “Let them go!”

“And if I don’t?”

He opened and closed his mouth a few times, then looked down at his friend with a shrug. “Please?” he said.

Yoz laughed. “Didn’t your mother tell you that was the magic word?”

She murmured and flicked a finger, released another wave of power not unlike the one that had forced the transformations earlier. This one wasn’t as sharp and curled around every individual, made them shiver; the effect on the three shapeshifters, however, was nothing short of astounding.

All three rose to their hind legs, reassumed a bipedal stance and something that approached their normal height; Sascha’s expression on being faced with a six foot tall humanoid rat was enough to set the Magus to snorting with laughter - Dirk shot an elbow into her ribs for that - although the semi-human feline that was Tobi also appeared to be rather daunted by the sight.

“He looks even bigger like that,” he hissed, the voice still recognisable. Dani glared at him, then folded his arms and switched the glare to the still chortling Mage.

“And you’re still a shortarse,” she replied, which earnt her another shot to the ribs from Dirk.

“So now what?” asked Felix, the words softer and rather lisped through the almost-human throat. Yoz shrugged.

“So now I head out and see if tonight’s little exhibition has stirred up any response--”

“What?” yelped Dirk, turning to scowl at her. “What do you mean?”

She hissed through her teeth. “You know - and pay attention, boys, this is important - that magic makes a kind of noise, right? So what I’ve done with these gents,” and her smirk was evil, “may well have flushed our murderer out. She won’t be expecting them to show themselves--”

“She?” said Kai.

“Murderer?” asked Andi.

“Magic. Fucking hell,” said Sascha, and buried his face in his hands. Markus patted him on the shoulder, smirked; Yoz clasped her hands in front of herself, and wore a very patient expression while they all got it out of their system. Once they’d run down a bit, she continued.

“Then I’ll meet up with you here in the morning and off we’ll all go to start the tour.”

Stunned silence. Until Jens piped up from the background:

“Um, excuse me? But that’s not right.”

Yoz folded her arms and stared at the young man. Andi, Kai, Weiki and Markus - having a very good idea of what was coming - covered their eyes and waited for the explosion.

“Not right,” growled Yoz.

Undeterred, Jens ploughed on with all the foolish bravery of one who had never crossed a Magus before. “Yeah. Because there’s no women allowed on the tour buses, you see.”

“Don’t kill him!” hissed Dirk in her ear through the spreading, awkward silence. “They need him!”

Eero squeaked and hid behind Dan once more, who pursed his lips and looked worried; Dirk leaned back, watched her face, and everyone else just stared either at the Magus - waiting for the explosion - or at Jens, with expressions ranging from admiration to shock at the sheer bullheaded idiocy of what he’d just said. Kai peered out from between his fingers.

The Magus smiled, spread her hands in a you-win gesture. “Oh, is that right? I didn’t know. OK then. Sorry about that. Well, I’ll see you when you get back.”

To stunned silence she turned her back on them and began to saunter toward the exit, then turned back when she was almost there with a snap of her fingers - which made the Rays flinch - and a sincere smile.

“Oh yes,” she added sweetly, “good luck turning back into humans, by the way. Bye lads.”

And with that she continued walking. Tobi, Felix and Dani exchanged glances, then glared murderously at Jens; Markus crossed the room in two quick strides, seized the young man by the scruff of the neck and shook him while Andi turned a helpless expression to Kai.

“Do something!” he hissed.

“Yoz!” he called, “wait!”

She stopped, her hand on the door, and cocked her head to eye him over her shoulder.

“It’s... more of a guideline than an actual rule,” Kai continued between his teeth, “right Jens?”

From where he dangled in Markus’ iron grip the asphyxiating guitarist flapped his hands in agreement that yes, it wasn’t what you might call a hard and fast rule, and could indeed be open to interpretation. She smiled.

“Good boys,” she said, and with a twitch of her fingers released another wave of magic across the assemblage. Dani, Tobi and Felix found themselves back in their human bodies, albeit stark naked in front of their amused audience; Markus dropped Jens at a word from Andi, and by the time anyone thought to look for Yoz she was gone.

“Where’d she go?” asked Tobi, grabbing what was left of his clothes and struggling into them.

Kai rubbed a hand across his eyes and sighed. “Off somewhere. Best get used to this, guys, she does it a lot.”

Silence fell as all fifteen of the men thought about what was going to be involved in the tour, and wondered why they’d ever agreed to it in the first place.

~*~

Yoz sat on the roof of the building and watched them leave, some of them glancing over their shoulders, some still talking - arguing, if the hand gestures were anything to go by - but all of them with expressions that showed them to be anything but happy. Dirk, Kai and Henjo were the last to leave; Dirk cast a last glance up at the roof as though he could feel the press of her gaze.

She leaned back, waited for them to go.

“Smooth, Magus,” said a voice from behind her, politely.

She settled herself more comfortably on the slates, and snorted softly. “Not really. But it achieved what I wanted it to - they’ll all be watching their backs tonight, and that’s the main thing. And they’ve all had a bloody good fright, which will hopefully instill some caution into their thick little heads.”

The marten stretched out on his side, crossed his ankles and grinned at her through his whiskers. “That will not last,” he said, and she passed him a cigarette.

“True,” she mumbled past one of her own, lit it with a flick of her fingers when her lighter turned out to be out of gas. She passed the lit smoke to Axel, flicked the dead lighter over the edge of the roof and listened to it shatter, far below on the pavement.

“Litterbug,” chuckled the ‘shifter, passing her smoke back.

“Whatever. Ready to work?”

The marten brought himself into a crouch, eyes bright. “Yes. You think there’s a chance the murderer is in the city right now?”

“A very good chance,” murmured Yoz as she set in motion the procedure; her awareness would splinter over the whole city in a thorough attempt to find the sorceress she strongly suspected was behind the whole deadly situation. She had her scent now, had felt her presence and recognised her changed sigil; some of it didn’t make sense, and the lack of understanding maddened her. _Although_ , she thought wryly with the part of her mind not involved with the magic, _I can always ask her when I do find her. With the aid of something sharp, I think...._

“That makes my blood run cold,” he muttered, eyes busy as he scanned the rooftops for movement.

“Remember,” she told him, her voice getting fainter as she fell into the trance, “first sign of vampires....”

“I know what to do, never fear,” he replied with a nod, and settled himself to guard the Magus as she sent herself into the ether, talent alive in the search for answers.

~*~

The buses were loaded, the equipment was stowed and everyone was accounted for - except Yoz.

Dirk paced, and wondered where the hell she was; he’d expected her to be at his apartment when he’d got home, but she hadn’t been there all night. Or dropped by in the morning, or sent word to him; and from his rather frantic questioning of the others, nobody else had seen her either.

It wasn’t until the engines had been started - Jens hoping fervently that they could slip away before the Magus found them - that she sauntered down the street, bag slung over her shoulder and cigarette dangling from the corner of her mouth.

Dirk stuck his head out of the door, waved her to hurry.

“Where the hell have you been?” he demanded, as she swung past him. The door hissed shut behind her, and she cocked an eyebrow at him. Kai patted her on the shoulder and made himself scarce, and Henjo rolled his eyes at Andi for the badgering tone in their bassist’s voice.

Yoz shouldered past him and headed for the stairs. “I’ve been busy, Dirk.”

He followed her, a scowl marring his face. “I was worried!”

Her snort had Kai biting his lip in an effort not to laugh. “What are you, my mother?”

That pulled him up short, the biting sarcasm of her tone bringing a very hurt expression. He opened his mouth to speak, but the dismissive flick of her hand in his direction closed it again, and he slid into an unoccupied seat; Henjo and Andi shared raised eyebrows at his gloomy countenance, and Kai headed off in pursuit of the Magus with a frown.

“Is she always like this?” asked Andi, and Henjo shrugged even as he retrieved a pack of cards from his pocket.

“No. Often, she’s worse. You want to play?”

The other man lit a cigar and wiggled his eyebrows. “Only if you want to lose all your money.”

~*~

All the curtains of the bunks were closed, the same dark maroon-red blanking any view of their interior; however, it was easy enough to tell which one Yoz had chosen as her own. For a start, she’d chosen one high up and in a corner, easy to defend. Second, she’d somehow changed the curtain so it was a heavy black velvet, with a white skull-and-crossbones embroidered on it - underneath which was stitched the lettering in stark white script: This Bunk Belongs To Yoz. Keep Out Or Die.

He snorted, and tugged the corner of it back.

The Magus glanced up at him, eyebrow cocked. “Can’t you read?” she asked him mildly.

It took him a few moments to reply; any answer he had ready - not to mention the planned tirade about being so unpleasant to Dirk - was lost in his shock at what he was currently seeing. Curled in the corner of her bunk she’d shed jacket and shirt, boots and jeans, although it wasn’t the sight of the Magus in her underwear that had flummoxed him so. No, it was the dressing over the huge, ugly tear in her side that had grabbed his attention.

“What?” she asked, laid the soiled pad aside and reached for her bag, rummaged through it.

“Tough night?” he asked, and was rewarded with a snort.

“You could say that. Now, unless you want me to steal a dose of that shine of yours I’d suggest you run along and leave me be - I’ll slap a cover over this and it’ll be just fine.”

“I don’t mind,” he began to protest, “you can--”

The snarl she shoved in his face took him aback. “I said leave me be! Now go cuddle with the boys downstairs and I’ll see you later. Goodbye.”

And with that he found himself pushed back across the aisle and the curtain whipped shut in his face. Well, it was clearly pointless trying to talk to her when she was in this foul a mood; but as Kai stalked off down the bus, he determined to have this out with her later. Much later. Once she’d calmed down enough to talk to him without pulling his balls off.

Even so - how had she got hurt? What had happened last night - and did it put them in any more danger?

He slumped into the seat opposite Dirk, and they brooded together.

~*~

Yoz grumbled to herself as she cleaned the wound. Bruised and sore, it had her cursing more than once; her hunt the previous night had ended in what could be described as a no score draw, her quarry vanishing into the ether right before her eyes. They’d both been bleeding, though, one good rip each, so that was a comfort. Wherever the bitch had run to, she’d be doing the same thing right about now - dressing her hurts and cursing the enemy.

Covered with a clean pad and left to do its own thing she crossed her legs, lit a fresh cigarette, and thought. Two tour buses containing two bands and all the techs they would need, plus a few other essential members of staff. So protecting everyone while they were moving would be a bitch, but then, a moving target was harder to hit; at least two of the three ‘shifters were on the other bus, which meant that they were covered from a physical defence point of view.

Three shape shifters. Not, strictly speaking, true. There were actually four.

She needed to speak to Weikath.

~*~

The lounge was almost deserted, most of the crew and band riding this bus having vanished up to the big lounge upstairs to watch DVDs - God alone knew of what, but it gave her the opportunity to slink down here and have that chat she needed with the cold-eyed guitarist. With, she knew now, a secret; she leaned over the back of the seat, and accepted a light for her cigarette from him, his expression rather resigned as though he’d been expecting her to seek him out. Weiki waved her to join him, and when she did so arched one black eyebrow at her.

She folded her arms on the table and they stared at each other, measured their opponent up, and considered how best to approach an undoubtedly delicate subject.

“I notice,” he began, “that you didn’t expose me with the others.” His voice was quiet, and she shrugged.

“First - you would have scared that lot into hysterics. Seeing their friends turn into mammals is bad enough, but something like you? Instant shit themselves moment.”

He snorted, but his careful expression urged her on. She ticked off points on her fingers as she continued.

“Second, you’re dangerous. Very fucking dangerous indeed. You wouldn’t even have to get close; I know for a fact that you can blind me from across a space a damn sight bigger than that rehearsal room, and you would have been on me before I could do a damn thing. So, self preservation. Third, I know you don’t have to do it as often as the others - being that much older a species, right?”

His smile was wry. “Yeah. It’s different for me.”

“Fourth,” she replied, “I’m pretty sure nobody knows about you but me. Your kind is so damn rare these days, and it hides so deep inside you - I take it nobody else here knows?”

He leaned forward, rested his elbows on the table between the seats and fixed her with one of his most piercing glares. “No, nobody knows. And I want it kept that way.”

The grin she shot back at him was unrepentant. “No worries. I don’t want to have to be keeping an eye on you as well. So you’ve never told anybody?”

A flash of grief and he lowered his eyes to the surface of his coffee.

“Ingo knew,” he said, softly. “We were telling secrets one night - more stoned than you would believe - and I told him.” He glanced at her, sorrow clear in the ice blue of his gaze. “I don’t think he ever forgave me.”

“Did you show him?”

Another shrug, just a twitch of one lean shoulder. “A little, I think. But there’s no half-way form for me like there is the others.”

Silence between the two of them for a moment, and when Yoz broke it her tone was almost gentle. “Must have been scary for him, then. Normal human reaction, though.”

That snort again, and the expression in the eyes had returned to flint. “Yes. So I don’t want this to get out.”

“Don’t want what to get out?” asked Markus, who had approached far more quietly than anyone his size should be able to. Yoz laughed up at him while Weiki just glared out of the window, a slight flush creeping across his pale cheeks.

“His secret love of short fat women with enormous breasts,” said the Magus with a wicked twinkle in her mismatched eyes, “and fat ankles.”

Markus howled with laughter while Weiki made gagging noises; but he caught her swift wink, and knew that she would be as good as her word.

__

~~tbc~~


	11. Ten

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "She is almost alone. And yet she cannot leave them, and she cannot defend them all; strife tears them from the inside, and her doubt and loneliness are our allies. We shall prevail this time."

_****_

Chapter Ten

Vega cursed the other Magus with everything she could summon up.

She also threw things, kicked the furniture, shrieked at the top of her voice, and generally gave in to the fury that had been burgeoning inside her since the other woman had made her appearance in the alley where she was carrying out her divine work. Blood ran down her arm, droplets flicked off to paint the walls and draw patterns on the pristine white tiles of the blank white room where she raved.

“You should get that looked at,” soothed a voice from the corner of the room, and Vega swung toward it with a hiss of fury.

“I have looked at it!” she shouted, and pressed her hand to the ugly wound on her shoulder just to feel the shiver of pain that radiated out from it. “And it’s fine,” she snapped, “it’ll heal.”

“That I don’t doubt,” continued the voice. “Nevertheless, you should let me attend to it for you.”

The sorceress stopped her pacing, and glared at the man for a moment; the smile that spread across her face was slow, predatory, and would have made any human that had to face it very uncomfortable indeed.

“Perhaps,” and her voice was a silken purr of temptation now, the full lips formed into a bow, “you would like to undertake that duty...personally?”

“It would be an honour,” he murmured, and moved away from the corner where he had waited while the sorceress’ fury spent itself on lesser objects. “And while I,” his hand caressed the curve of her hip, moulded over the smooth arc of her buttocks, “ _attend_ to it, you can tell me what happened.”

“With pleasure,” said the sorceress, and her laugh was throaty and wicked.

~*~

Slender threads of awareness danced across the city, ethereal but real enough to pluck the hairs from a sleeping dog, pull down a blind to shield a fussing child from the glare of the harsh streetlamps, tease a cat that jumped at shadows. They felt their way under doors, walked across rooftops, spied and pried at the life of the city; they searched under the command of the one who had sent them forth, made up of her mind-self and soul, there and not-there in equal proportions. Her body remained on its roof, watched over by the faithful marten, his human awareness damped down to allow his Beast to monitor the surroundings.

_There._

Yoz opened her eyes, and the blue burned with the fire of a new born sun. Found her; she was hunting, and had homed in on her prey. Time was short, and if they were going to make it in time the Magus was going to have to move with some speed. Quick as thought she reeled in the searching fibres of self, all except the one that had found her quarry; that one she would follow like a fish on a line until she found the one that they were looking for.

She leaped to her feet, slapped Axel on the shoulder; the marten was but a breath behind her as she raced down the fire escape, the last few steps hurdled before she could hare off down the street in search of a car to steal. It didn’t take her long to find one, and the two of them barely exchanged a word until they got to the street where she’d felt the sorceress at her business. 

The crumbling facades of the buildings, the broken pavement and missing streetlamps gave the area an air of menace; it was so perfect for what was about to take place that Yoz almost hesitated. It looked like a stage set, one designed to strike fear into the heart of the adventurer.

Anything this perfect had to be wrong--

One moment’s doubt, that was all she allowed herself; then she was off after the mental scent trail left by Vega, their reunion long overdue. The marten kept pace with the Magus, both of them always on the alert for the unexpected, the bullet from the shadows or the looming bulk of one left to trip them, to slow or to harm them, any delay being beneficial to the one that they sought.

Nothing, and when they skidded around the final turn both were wild-eyed with unfulfilled anticipation. Sure enough, there she was; her prey this night was a rat, white hairs of age sprinkled through his coat, backed into a corner with several smaller shapes huddled behind him. They wept and begged, and although he snarled defiance his fear was as palpable as a fist in the face.

“Vega!” roared Yoz, anger driving the shout from her. It was a mistake.

She turned, eyed the running pair coolly; then she lifted the gun she held in her right hand and loosed a spray of bullets in their direction. The rat before her couldn’t even take advantage of the distraction; she had another of the evil machine pistols in her left hand, and the muzzle of that one never so much as twitched.

Axel and Yoz dived to either side in a desperate attempt to avoid the bullets. They almost succeeded; Yoz had managed to throw a partial shield up before them, but she’d expected something of a pause before the sorceress released the deadly rain on them. There hadn’t even been that, and one of the bullets brought the marten down with a shriek. By his violent reaction to it she knew it couldn’t be lead, or steel, or any one of the normal compounds bullets were made of; this one had to contain a certain amount of silver, in whatever form - which, whilst unlikely to be fatal from a single round, would certainly keep him out of any ensuing fray.

The shrieks from the rats brought Yoz to her feet. Too late for them as well; Vega had cut them apart with a hail of bullets, the Magus unable to prevent her from doing so while she kept her own head down. 

Silence fell, except for the metallic chuckle of spent shell casings, dead magazines ejected to bounce against the warped concrete of the alley floor. Vega turned, stood hipshot as she reloaded, and watched her enemy stalk toward her.

“Long time no see, Yolanda,” she said, her voice cool. As when they had last met, the taller woman was dressed impeccably; all in black, her long sleek legs encased in black leather and her body cradled in some kind of raven silk that revealed the curves underneath with every smooth glide of movement, flares of blue reflected from the surface wherever it caught the light. She was finished off with an elegant black coat; fitted at the waist it flared to a wide skirt, the whole ensemble looking like something from a Nazi’s wet dream. Beautiful but cold, her makeup and hair perfect she was quite a contrast to the scruffy woman that approached her, her clothing showing more by way of hard use than modishness.

“Why, Vega?” and now Yoz halted. Well within point blank range of the deadly machine pistols she nevertheless ignored them; now that she knew what sort of weaponry the other woman was relying on she could defend against it. Only the element of surprise had made her vulnerable to the bullets, and from the sick noises behind her she knew that her ally was paying the price for that.

Vega shrugged, holstered the weapons at her hips and folded her arms. “Humanity doesn’t need my help to destroy itself,” she said, as calm as if they were discussing the weather, here in this alley surrounded by the stink of blood and filth, spilled rubbish and splashed bodily fluids. “Whereas certain others, well, they need a little... push.”

She smiled. Yoz hunched her shoulders, growled. “ _Why_ like this, though? Is the Darkness so desperate for victory that you’re reduced to slaughtering,” and the jerk of her hand took in the pathetic forms against the wall behind her, “innocents? Those that are of no real significance to anyone but their families?”

“I wouldn’t expect you to understand,” said the sorceress, and her perfect lips slid into another sly smile. “And I am not in the mood to explain, so I think--”

She got no further because that was when Yoz decided she was done listening, and flung herself at her.

~*~

“Then what happened?” asked Kai, his eyes wide as he listened to the Magus’ sorry tale of the abortive attempt to stop her enemy. Yoz hissed the last of her cigarette smoke between her teeth, then ground the butt out in the ashtray. She, Kai, Henjo, Dirk, Andi, Weiki and Markus had gathered at one end of the lounge once she’d decided to rejoin them; they clustered around one of the tables, surrounded by a variety of bottles and mugs and full ashtrays, half full cigarette packets and the other detritus that gathers around men on the move.

“We rolled around the floor for a bit, then she got the drop on me and fucked off. I don’t know where she went - I was too busy getting Axel to medical assistance to worry about it. She’ll be back.”

“What do you mean, ‘she got the drop on you’?” asked Henjo, a frown creasing the skin between his brows.

Yoz drew shapes in the varnish of the table top, erased them with a brush of her fingertips before they could solidify into anything they might have recognised. “Just that. Leave it, Henjo.”

He opened his mouth to speak, then snapped it shut again when Kai poked him under the table. There was silence for a while, the Magus still lost in thought, the men around her not at all sure what to say.

“The bizarre thing is,” the Magus continued, brow furrowed in thought, “technically? My job is done. I’ve told the ‘shifters who’s doing the killing - Axel’s going to get a message back to London - and that information will get to the vampires, so they can send someone to switch off this bomb in my head.”

“Bomb?” said Andi and Markus together, eyes widened in shock. Dirk flapped a hand at them.

“It’s not dangerous to anyone else,” he said, and Andi cocked an eyebrow.

“Who’s got a bomb?” asked Sascha, who’d wandered over to see what was going on. He took a seat next to Markus, and watched the little gathering carefully. 

“I have,” sighed Yoz, “in my head. Wrapped around my medulla oblongata and set to go off if I do anything bad to a vampire.”

Silence hung over the table for a moment, then Sascha shook his head.

“Bullshit.”

Her answering smile was amused. “And just which part is bullshit, Sascha?” she said, eyes bright. “Vampires? Or a bomb in my head? Or a man that can hunt as a cat, steal around the city as a rat, walk its alleys as a fox? Someone who can call the soul from a piece of stone, even after that stone is riven and used to build? Tell me, Sascha. In your infinite wisdom--”

Kai touched her arm, and she broke off with a snort. Dani had sidled up while she spoke, and he touched Sascha’s shoulder with a shake of his head.

“Leave him alone, Magus.”

“Get off me,” snapped Sascha. He jerked to his feet, stalked off down the bus; he found a seat apart from the techs playing cards at the far end of the lounge, flung himself into it. A big man, he nevertheless managed to curl himself up into a ball, one arm wrapped close around his knees while the other brought his hand to his mouth, full lips closing over fingertips for him to bite at in his confusion and fretful anger. Dani went to follow him, face clouded; Markus stopped him, a shake of his head accompanied by a mournful expression in the deep blue-grey eyes. Weiki rose, gave the Magus a nod as he passed her; he touched Dani’s chest, long fingers brushed against him in a gesture of comfort.

“I’ll speak to him. Don’t worry.”

The drummer sank into Sascha’s abandoned seat, rubbed one hand across his face. Over his shoulder Weiki could be seen, long form folded into the seat next to Sascha, a frown on his face as he spoke quietly to the fretting man. Sascha’s answers were sharp, but softened as they went on; their discussion drifted in and out of hearing as Dani looked at the table and swore.

“He having a problem?” asked Henjo.

Dani gave an angry hiss between his teeth. “He asked me what it was like, earlier. I tried to explain, where it comes from and how it feels--” he broke off, pinched the bridge of his nose. “I tried, I really did. How when you’re in your Beast you don’t care about the future, and all the past means is what you’ve learned. You don’t worry, you don’t think about the future - you just _are_.” He looked up, and his mouth was drawn down into an unhappy curve. “But you know what he said? He asked if I’d ever lived in a sewer. A _sewer_.”

Silence fell across the table once more, and Andi shook his head.

“I’ll talk to him,” he told them, and gave Dani’s shoulder a squeeze as he went. Markus murmured in the drummer’s ear, and the pair left the table and headed for the upstairs lounge; Kai, Dirk, Henjo and Yoz were left to stare at each other across the wreckage of the evening’s discussion and a litter of paper cups. The air resonated with the sound of the bus engines, and was thick with the pain of friendships strained to the point beyond which they may never recover.

~*~

Dirk wasn’t surprised when the Magus crawled into his bunk that night. It was a habit of hers, he’d noticed; when things were going badly, or she was at all unsure of herself she would seek out another warm body to curl up next to, another voice to share inconsequentialities with. Perhaps it was a reconnection that reminded her why she was doing it all, and he wondered what she did when she was off on her own.

It occurred to him that she might be lonely.

Long arms pulled her close, and they twined around each other in silence for a while. The bunks were, by necessity, small, and the space soon warmed to tropical levels with two bodies enclosed in it. Dirk felt her begin to shake with laughter, and angled his head down to see her face.

“What?”

“I wonder how Sascha fits in one of these? Bloody great thing that he is.”

“Heh,” he chuckled. “With difficulty, I expect. I’ve never looked.”

Silence between them again, and he nuzzled his nose into her hair. If he shut his eyes and just let his body feel then everything would be alright; her heart beating against him, the minute shifts of her body where she pressed against him, the warm-cool of her breath against his bare shoulder. Nothing but two people laying close to enjoy each other.

Although bearing in mind that all he wore was boxers and she didn’t have much more on, things could get real uncomfortable if she didn’t keep the wriggling against him to a minimum.

Her next words drove such thoughts from his mind. 

“I can’t contact James,” she murmured into his neck, and he felt as though she’d poured cold water on him. So she was here because she couldn’t talk to a vampire? That was why she was in need of a little physical contact?

He drew his arms back, and linked his fingers behind his head. 

“James,” he said when she lifted her head to look at him in surprise, and even she had to wince at the chill that invaded his voice.

“Yeah, James,” she replied. “Don’t get all pissy on me, Dirk--”

He levered himself up on his elbows and glared. “Oh, should I not? He has you on a chain, Yoz. You let him put that thing in your head, you let him bind himself to your mind and body, and yet you won’t let me in?”

He was getting angry now, and the Magus levered herself upright, away from him, her expression showing her surprise. He was pretty surprised himself; this feeling of betrayal had lurked so deep not even he’d realised how strong it was. But now it all bubbled to the surface, and he couldn’t have stopped it even if he’d wanted to.

“What the--” she began, but the words just poured from him now that the barrier had broken.

“You keep me at a distance, you push me away all the time - oh, unless you’re feeling in need of a little comfort, then it’s ‘Dirk will help’, ‘Dirk will understand’. And I do, right up until you feel a little better then you put the walls back up and I’m tired of climbing them, Yoz! You went into Henjo’s mind without hesitation, you even let a vampire into yours - when is it my turn?”

“I’ve been in your head, Dirk--”

“That was different!”

They stared at each other across a widening gulf of anger and mistrust, and in the end the Magus shook her head sadly.

“I thought you got this, Dirk. I thought you ‘got’ _me_. Because you’re the only one of these daft bastards that’s seen the Darkness from the inside - you know it for what it truly is. And it’s still in your heart, isn’t it?”

He dropped his gaze, shrugged. When she put it like that, well... it was about trust, in the end. And she was saying that she trusted him. But even so... even so.

She slid to the edge of the bunk, swung her legs out. “Forget it, Dirk. I’ve been doing this for a hell of a long time without you, and if that’s the way it’s gotta be well fine. That’s just fine.”

A twist and she was gone, the thump of her landing outside his bunk followed shortly by the sound of her scrambling into her own. He lay back on his pillow, squeezed his eyes shut; that hadn’t gone at all well, and he cursed himself for letting his anger get the better of him. 

But the longer he thought about it, the more he felt the anger stir; he was in the right, dammit! He hadn’t said a damn thing that wasn’t true, that didn’t describe how he felt. So she was just going to have to work through it herself. He didn’t need her. He’d been happy enough before her, and he’d manage just fine now.

Dirk turned on his side, flicked off the overhead light, and tried to sleep.

~*~

The shows were a great success, although Helloween had dropped the guitar battle between Sascha and Dani; ostensibly they didn’t have time for it, but the real reason was the discomfort Sascha felt around his bandmate. He hid it well on stage, but only because drummer and guitarist didn’t have much to do with each other. 

Offstage was a different matter. He was rather stiff with Felix and Tobi, but once again the fact that there were so many of them was the saving of that. He didn’t have to be around them very much, and he took advantage of that situation to the full.

Markus and Andi still worked on him, as did the others; it had come as a hell of a shock to them all that people they worked with, lived with for extended periods of time weren’t quite...human. 

Dirk and Yoz remained in a state of armed neutrality.

Four dates in November, all separated by considerable chunks of time. Munich, back to Hamburg - amidst much grumbling that they should have done that one first - Frankfurt and finally Cologne. When they returned to Hamburg Yoz found Axel, and the marten was doing well; the silver-laced bullet had torn him up inside, but he was well on the road to recovery. He was able to tell her that word had returned from London, and all ‘shifters - everywhere - were now hunting the insane giantess.

Less gratifying was the news that James had been dispatched by the Council of Vampires to remove the worm from her head; he should have been with her by the time of her return to Hamburg. The fact that he was nowhere to be found - and the local vampires were being anything but helpful - boded ill both for the individual and the Magus.

For only the second time in her life, she found herself worried about the fate of a vampire.

~*~

“Yoz?”

Cross legged in her bunk, she tried to ignore the voice that called from the aisle outside. Ignored or not, after a moment of hesitation the curtain was twitched back and she found herself looking straight into Andi’s worried frown.

“What?” she asked him, and scooped up the handful of knucklebones she’d been using to try and beat some sense out of the future with. Andi eyed them, then shrugged; she pinched her lips together in amusement, and wondered what his reaction would be if she told him that they were, indeed, human bones - as he had suspected before he crushed the thought as unnecessarily paranoid.

“Can I come in?”

She eyed the small space, then shrugged and scooted to one end, curled up on herself to allow him as much space as possible. He hoisted himself up and wriggled around until he was almost comfortable, ignoring the snort from the woman at his reddened face.

“That’s why you take the bottom bunk these days, huh?” she said as she leaned over him to tug the curtain shut. He eyed the tattooed cleavage that the move gave him a good look at, then shrugged around a wry smile.

“As good a reason as any.”

She sat back up, and for a moment the pair eyed each other in silence. 

“It’s getting worse for Sascha,” he said finally, and she heaved a sigh.

“I know. If there was any other way I could have got you all to believe me, I would have taken it.”

Andi cocked an eyebrow. “Would you? From what I’ve heard you seem to like causing a stir--”

“Causing a stir, yes,” she said with a snort, “but destroying the bonds between so many? Although,” she added, “the Edguys seem to have taken it well.”

This was true. They had assimilated the information very well indeed, to the point that the others had taken to teasing them about it when Sascha wasn’t present. Weiki in particular took an evil delight from clicking his fingers and calling ‘here kitty kitty’, often when Tobi was attempting to chat up some woman or other. And the number of cat toys with bells, fake mice and catnip that kept being snuck into his and Felix’s bunks on the other bus was phenomenal.

Even Jens, as the Edguy most freaked out by the revelation, had come to an understanding with the situation; he’d tried talking to Sascha about it, but hadn’t had any more luck than anyone else. For some reason, the guitarist was determined to remain horrified at the revelation that his friend wasn’t what he appeared to be on a daily basis. The thought that something else lurked below the surface was appalling to him, and he clung to his hurt like a child.

“And Markus is finding it hard too,” Andi continued, breaking into her thoughts with a sigh. She nodded, pulled a face; the hold the vampires had over the big bassist hadn’t lessened any with time. And the creativity-stifling effect of their contact was possibly the most distressing thing she’d seen for a long time; it broke her heart to see Markus trying and trying again to write music, to come up with lyrics, to create anything - and failing.

It was making him surly, which only added to the tension on the crowded bus. The fact that the gigs were so spread out compared to a normal tour was also part of the problem; too much time to think between shows, too much waiting, too much empty space with nothing to do but brood.

It was all falling apart, and there wasn’t a damn thing she could do.

“Not to mention the fact that Henjo’s strung out to buggery,” she said, an air of gloom descending upon the pair.

Andi flipped open the ventilator and lit a cigar. “And is there nothing you can do?” he asked, picking his words with care. The Magus’ temper was fast becoming a thing of legend on the tour; more than once she’d been observed in hot pursuit of Tobi, Eggi or Dirk - partners in crime as often as not - for something they had done to her hotel room. The screaming after the cling film on the toilet seat incident had been horrific, as had the moment when she had fallen to her bed in exhaustion only to find the pillowcase filled with shaving cream.

“Not until I get this fucking thing out of my head,” she admitted, through clenched teeth. Having to concede that she _couldn’t_ do something was a terrible strain for the Magus, and it was happening with distressing frequency on this tour. “But until that damn vampire shows up there’s nothing, no. Come on Andi, give - what else?”

He hesitated, dropped his gaze and picked at a piece of lint on his jeans. A glance shot up at her through his fringe, and with a sigh he gave her the rest of it. “Only nothing has been done to us, you see. Not since, well,” and he fidgeted again, “not since you showed up. So we were wondering if--”

Yoz leaned back against the wall of the bunk, startled. “If I went away, would it stop?”

Andi nodded, and avoided her eyes by staring hard at the back of the black curtain. She was going to turn him into a frog, he knew it; he wondered if he’d like life as a frog, and if it would hurt.

A snort jerked his attention back, and he was relieved to see that she was smiling. A rather pained smile, it was true, but a smile nevertheless.

“I’m not gonna turn you into a frog,” she sighed. “If nothing else, it would take more energy than I’ve got. Besides, it would be a great way to show you I’m on your side, wouldn’t it? ‘I’m all for you guys, and oh by the way here’s your vocalist. Ribbit.’”

She pulled out her cigarettes, lit one, puffed, and stared at it for a moment with a frown. Both of them did; she took another fruitless drag, then held the offending item between them. She made a small noise of disbelief deep in her throat.

Smoke drifted out from several tiny holes punched along its length, and she ground her teeth even as Andi began to snicker.

“However, as soon as we stop? I’m going to find that bloody arse Sammet and turn him into something _way_ nastier than a frog. And I’m going to enjoy doing it, too.”

The snicker was becoming a chortle, and the Magus cocked an eye at Andi. 

“I’m sorry, it’s just - how did he get hold of your cigarettes?”

She shrugged. “I’m out all night trying to find some trace of Vega, or vampires - so I sleep all day. That little shit and his merry men get on here and grab what they can before I wake up - you know they put toothpaste in my boots last week? Wankers.”

“Welcome to life on the road,” the other man laughed, and she was forced to snort in agreement. The amusement faded, and she sighed.

“Look, I know how it must seem - I really wouldn’t be here if I didn’t think you were in some kind of danger.”

“You mean _Dirk_ was in some kind of danger.”

She winced. “That’s not entirely fair, Andi. I’m doing what I can with Henjo to control that talent of his, but it’s hard. And developing Kai’s power, not to mention keeping an eye on that darkness of - yes - Dirk’s. There’s been a whiff of demon involvement here, Andi, and believe me you don’t want any of them sniffing around. There’s nothing I can do about Markus or Sascha. I wish I could.”

He shook his head. “We’ve been through so much... it would have been nice to just have some fun, you know?”

Eyes closed against the pain in his voice, Yoz hoped with everything in her soul for things to start going right for them all, for her, for him; because right now, it was all falling to pieces.

And there wasn’t a bloody thing she could do about it. 

_Some friend you are_ , she thought bitterly.

~*~

Relaxed on her dark throne, Vega opened her eyes and smiled. Surrounding lackeys fawned at her feet, poured their adoration over her, fuelled her arrogance, her certainty and her powers all at the same time. She tilted her head at her companion, and he entered the blinding brilliance of the white-lit room with a bow; the brightest light, she said, threw the darkest shadow. And she was going to throw the blackest shadow the world had ever seen.

“They come, my friend,” she told him, and her voice was a purr of deep and silken pleasure.

Jaan went to one knee before her, and kissed her hand. “As you said they would, my lady.”

“She is almost alone. And yet she cannot leave them, and she cannot defend them all; strife tears them from the inside, and her doubt and loneliness are our allies. We shall prevail this time.”

“As you say, my lady,” replied the vampire, and settled to sit at her feet, perfectly comfortable with his role. The prey would come to them, and there was nothing she could do about it. Not a damn thing.

_~~tbc~~_


	12. Eleven

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Until she saw this lot headed home and safe and Vega was lying cold and dead in a pool of her own intestines Yoz was going precisely nowhere—or rather, she was going where the bands went until she could figure out exactly what her adversary's interest in them was.

_****_

Chapter Eleven

Yoz strolled around the backstage area, and enjoyed getting in everyone’s way.

As nothing had happened, she couldn’t find a vampire to throttle for information (and wasn’t allowed to throttle it even had she been able to find one anyway), the Weavers weren’t returning her calls and the entire group on both tour buses was now regarding her with deep suspicion, she was in sore need of something to bolster her flagging confidence. Perhaps actually attending a gig instead of working her fingers to the bone in an attempt to keep this ungrateful lot safe would be just the ticket.

Dirk’s guitar tech dropped her a wink as he hurried past; she’d always got along well with Piesel, and their relationship remained distant but good. Unlike the one she had with his boss, of course.

That was still well and truly fucked.

Tonight was Gamma Ray’s turn to headline; all through the tour the Edguys had gone on first, and then the other two bands had taken it in turns. Both were enjoying the change of pace, despite all the strife behind the scenes. Strife which, they were beginning to feel, might be eased if the Magus went back to walking her lonely road and left theirs the hell alone.

Not a chance. Until she saw this lot headed home and safe and Vega was lying cold and dead in a pool of her own intestines Yoz was going precisely nowhere - or rather, she was going where the bands went until she could figure out exactly what her adversary’s interest in them was.

Apart from the obvious fact, she thought to herself as she mooched into the green room to join the relaxing Edguys, that they were very easy on the eyes.

“Gents,” she said, and helped herself to a beer. Tobi grinned at her from under his towel.

“Sorry about the cigarettes,” he said, and she flicked the bottle cap at him with a snort. It bounced from the dead centre of his forehead, even though he’d ducked.

“Lying sack of shit you are, Sammet. You just wait, I shall have my revenge.”

To a chorus of amused hoots she advanced on him, waved her beer bottle in a mock-threat.

“I’m scared,” he grinned, nipping behind the sofa where sprawled Eggi, Dirk and Jens.

“You should be,” she said, eyes narrowed, “because I tell you, kittycat, one morning you’re going to wake up and find yourself neutered. Be warned.”

All the men groaned and crossed their legs, although Jens was the only one who looked really worried. Yoz dropped onto the sofa between he and Eggi, and laid her head on the cringing guitarist’s shoulder - much to the amusement of the others.

“Aw, you’re quite safe, my boy - you’re way too young and pretty for me. And _you_ haven’t done anything horrid to my smokes.”

“It’s bad for you,” said Tobi, assuming a mock-noble pose before the sofa. “I’m doing you a favour in the long run.” She bounced to her feet and began to stalk him around the room, cheered on by the watchers lounged in comfort behind them.

“Mess with my magic, my man and my beer - but toucheth not my smokes, dear boy.”

He flung up his hands and dived to hide behind Markus, who had just entered the room with the rest of the Helloween gang. Fresh out of the showers they wanted nothing more than a snack and then to get to the bus; tonight would be a long drive from Milan to Rome, and they wanted to get as much rest as they could. Markus eyed the smaller man who ducked and weaved behind him, a grin on his face as the Magus growled and tried to catch him.

“You’re in a good mood,” said Sascha, watching the show from behind the sofa, arms folded.

Dani, filling his plate on the other side of the room, automatically ducked his head when he heard the coldness in the other man’s voice.

She turned her shoulder to Tobi, ignored him until he poked his head round Markus to see what she was doing; then with a lunge she caught him and slapped his arse, hard. The sharp noise and the yelp from Tobi reduced his bandmates to tears of laughter, and he retreated behind them with a scowl. From the safety zone behind the sofa he glared at her and poked his tongue out - but took off running once more when she growled and advanced on him.

Fooling around over she shook herself and turned to Sascha with a smile. “Well, moping’s not getting anything done, is it? And I thought I’d see how it was all going here tonight. Looking good out there, by the way.”

“Thank you,” said Markus gravely, and she inclined her head to him in a graceful bow, and winked. Sascha snorted.

“Well, enjoy it while you can,” he snapped at her, coming out from behind the sofa, “because soon the tour will be over and you’ll be exposed as a liar and a cheat.”

The Mage’s expression fell, and she turned to face him. The rest of the men in the room became silent, the atmosphere tense as the two squared up to each other. It should have looked ridiculous, the man at six foot eight and his adversary barely reaching five four, but somehow it didn’t; he was hunched and tense, and she stood with hands on hips and stared, dared him to dig himself a hole any deeper.

“A liar. And a cheat,” she repeated, and each of the words dropped into the sudden silence like lumps of lead.

He balled his fists and stepped toward her. “She told me you would be. She said that you were jealous--”

Yoz slapped one hand against the centre of Sascha’s chest, and shoved him back until he hit the wall and lost all his wind with a whoosh. 

“’She’ said? Who she, Sascha? And please, please don’t tell me it’s who I think it is, because if I find out that you’ve been--”

He came back at her, and now she was the one who gave ground in the face of his anger. “You’ll what? Come on, what will you do? Turn me into a mouse?”

Dani, who had been about to go to Sascha’s aid, stepped back and shut his mouth with a snap; he and Andi retreated to lean against the far wall, soon joined by Weiki and Markus. Despite the tension, none of the older men paused in their eating and drinking; they’d all seen drama on the road before, and sometimes it came down to a damn good punch up to clear the air.

The Edguys just sat and watched, stunned at the transformation of the Magus from playful to deadly in an instant.

“Why are you so angry, Sascha?” she asked, keeping a distance of a few feet between even as he advanced on her, “what’s in your head?”

“Nothing is in my head!” he shouted back at her. “Anything that’s in my head is there because you put it there with your magic and your hate!”

“ _My_ hate?” and now she gave a snort of derision, “Sascha, I haven’t got time to hate anyone. And before we start to break the furniture, I think we should take this outside.”

“Very wise,” said Weiki dryly from his post against the wall. She inclined her head and shot him a wink, which is when Sascha lost his temper completely and went for her.

She didn’t even look at him.

“On your knees, boy,” she said, and her tone was mild. To everyone’s shock he fell as though shot, knelt just out of arm’s reach in the middle of the floor. She turned, folded her arms and smirked; the growl he shot back at her was without a doubt the most aggressive sound any of them had ever heard from the usually mild-mannered giant. 

“You’re going to fight me with magic?” he snapped, and she shrugged.

“Nope. But I’m going to get you outside with magic,” she told him, and with a short bow to the assembled watchers she strolled to the door, a quick glance over her shoulder when she reached it as though she’d forgotten something. “Ah yes,” she said, “Sascha, come.”

And she snapped her fingers at him before she turned and walked away. To his utter horror his limbs betrayed him and he followed her on all fours, crouched like a beast, swearing between his teeth the whole way.

The men left in the room exchanged glances.

“This,” said Tobi with a snort, “I have _got_ to see.”

In moments, the room was empty.

~*~

Behind the venue lay a quiet courtyard in which were parked the buses, the trucks, and the equipment trailers; all the waiting vehicles, however, still didn’t quite fill the space to overflowing. There was just enough room - out of the sight of any casual observers - for Sascha and Yoz to fight. Once they’d made their way out there she released him, a smug expression still on her face at his sputtering fury.

The concrete under their feet glittered with frost, and the bus windows showed a delicate tracery of it; the combatant’s breath steamed in the freezing winter air as they circled, the small woman watching every heartbeat of her much larger opponent.

He didn’t waste any time talking, just flung himself at her; she sidestepped, always a hairsbreadth out of his reach as he roared and charged again. Andi, now in the doorway with the rest of the wide-eyed watchers, let out a short bark of laughter.

“This reminds me of a bullfight I saw once,” he said. “I just hope he doesn’t end up the same way the bull did.”

Eggi snickered. “I’m sure she won’t kill him.”

“I’m not,” muttered Jens, and Tobi gave him a gentle thump on the arm. 

“She’s dangerous,” he said, “not stupid.”

“Dangerous, stupid, I don’t care,” grumbled Weiki, who had been dragged out with the rest, “it’s too cold out here to watch them messing around. I’ll be inside when they’re done playing. And why is it so cold? Italy should be warm, dammit....”

Beyond the amusement and the sniping the fight was getting serious. Yoz had progressed beyond infuriating her opponent by staying just out of his reach, and now gave him a swift kick in the backside every time he rushed past her. He poured sweat, panted with effort and she was still as cool as when they’d started, and mismatched eyes measured every move he made.

“Bitch,” he panted, after she gave him a particularly nasty kick to the lower back.

“You know it,” she replied, and went on the attack herself.

She booted him round the courtyard for a while until she got bored; then, noting that Andi was now wearing an expression of concern, she decided that enough was enough and they all had a long journey tonight. Time for the endgame, then; with a quick sidestep and a sweep she took his legs from under him, and sent him to the concrete with a crash.

“When you wake up,” she told him as he fought his way back to his knees, “we need to have a nice long talk. But not until.”

And with that she delivered a sharp blow to the side of his head. Sascha’s eyes rolled up in his head and he fell over again, but this time when his head bounced from the slick, icy surface of the concrete he failed to get up. She raised a hand, forestalled the concerned rush of his friends; then, to all of their surprise, she took an arm and began to haul him up. 

Once she had him sprawled - rather awkwardly - across her shoulders, she flapped a hand at the watchers. “He’ll be fine. I’ll put him in his bunk and have a chat to him in the morning. Markus, a hand here?”

The other big man hurried forward, and between the two of them they manhandled Sascha into the bus. Once the door hissed closed behind them Andi clapped his hands, and began to shepherd everyone back inside.

“Come on, show’s over. Let’s have another beer and tell the others what happened when they get done.”

Tobi threw a last glance over his shoulder at the bus into which the three had vanished.

“Dirk’s going to go crazy,” he murmured.

“Kai isn’t going to be too pleased either,” chuckled Andi. “Now come on, before they run out of beer.”

~*~

By the time the others began to board the buses - duty done with waiting fans, all the gear packed for the long drive ahead - Yoz was sitting beside a still somnolent Sascha, the fingertips of her left hand resting on his forehead while her right spun a globe of white mist that shapes rolled though like slow lightning. Markus was with her, supporting the sleeping man as he watched her attentively, sometimes a frown darting across his face as she murmured to herself.

“I thought you were going to leave him until he’d slept?” asked Andi, and slid into the seat next to Markus.

“I was,” she replied, still intent on the globe that hovered just above the tips of her fingers, “but I had a quick peep and bloody Vega’s done quite a bit of damage in there. So to speak,” she added when Andi’s eyes went wide with shock.

Kai, Henjo and Dani wedged themselves on the other side of the table to watch; Dirk stalked past without so much as a glance in their direction, Weiki just rolled his eyes and went to his bunk, and their techs hung around and tried to look as though they weren’t paying attention from a distance.

Yoz acknowledged them with a flick of her eyes and a brief smile.

“Right,” she said to her audience as the bus pulled away, “see in here? That’s a representation of his mind. The white flares, they’re him. But if you look here,” and she rotated the globe a little, moved her fingers across his forehead, “you can see those yellow bits? Those and the red flares - there’s one - are foreign matter. Ideas and blocks placed there by someone else.”

Fascinated, they leaned in for a better look. It was hard to believe that the misty ball of light she balanced so delicately could represent a whole mind, a force of personality reduced to little more than an eldritch readout. But there was something in the way it moved and curled within itself that seemed familiar, at least to those who knew Sascha well; Markus’ words caught their attention, although the Magus continued to stare and mutter to herself.

“It’s true,” he said quietly, “I’ve been watching.”

“Welcome to my world,” said Kai with a grin, and Henjo elbowed him.

“So now what?” asked Dani. She smiled at the globe.

“I remove them, which if nothing else should piss Vega off no end. I think she’s been watching us through him - so once I break her connection she’s going to be angry. Keep your eyes open, because when she strikes she’ll hit hard.”

“Don’t you mean ‘if’?” supplied Dani.

“If I meant if, I would have said if. Now hush, this is complicated.”

She began to chant, and narrowed her eyes at the globe; her fingers stroked across the skin of Sascha’s forehead, and the misty glow from the ball began to roll down her right arm, across her throat, and down her left to touch the young man’s face. The watchers were silent, as absorbed as she in the work she was doing; they could all see the twists of yellow and the explosive scarlet within the sphere fighting to stay, to hide under the gleaming whites and silvers of the natural thoughts.

They were losing, that was clear. Sascha turned and mumbled in his sleep, and Markus’ arms tightened around his chest to hold him still. The intruding colours were forced up, first to writhe on the surface of the globe and then, with a series of gasps and spurts of vapour, out of it and into nothingness. Once one went the others followed suit quickly; the construct sputtered and hissed, but by the time she’d finished it rolled cool and smooth again, no trace of anything that wasn’t belonging to the owner of the mind. A snap of her fingers and the mist dissolved; Sascha gave a snort, and settled down to sleep again.

Yoz sat back and grinned. She looked tired; a sheen of sweat clung to her face, and her fringe had stuck itself together in rat’s tails, but her eyes were bright and wicked when she regarded her audience.

“And that,” she said, “is all there is to it.”

~*~

They all had to assist in getting Sascha up the stairs to his bunk, as his sheer size made the exercise something of a logistic nightmare. Once he’d been stuffed - in an untidy muddle - into his own bunk, everyone was too tired to do any more, and most sought their own rest. Yoz had barely stretched out when there was a scrape at the curtain, and when she twitched it back she was rather surprised to see Markus.

“Hey,” she said, and his slow smile drew an answering one from her. She couldn’t help it; the expression was so filled with shy happiness that it just demanded a like response.

“Can we talk?” he asked, and she shuffled up to one end of the bunk to make room. 

Watching someone his size fold themselves into the end of one of the small bunks was impressive enough, but his smug pleasure at being able to make himself comfortable made her snort with amusement.

“That was amazing, what you did,” he said to her, his deceptively sleepy eyes fixed on her face. She shrugged.

“Thanks, but I really should have spotted it earlier. I could have saved you all a lot of heartache.”

She passed him one of her cigarettes, and they smoked in silence for a while. Eventually she nudged him with her toe.

“Come on, out with it.”

“I thought you could read minds?”

“I can, but I’m tired and anyway, it’s impolite.”

He chuckled at that, and she reflected that he had a nice laugh. He went quiet again, and heaved a great sigh before he tipped his head to look at her, almost shyly, through his eyelashes.

“Will Sascha be good with Dani now?” he asked, and she cocked an eyebrow before answering.

“That wasn’t what you were going to say, was it? But the answer is that I don’t know - I think she took a reaction that was already there and just emphasised it. And he’s going to remember what an utter bitch he’s been these last few weeks, so... we’ll have to see, basically. But at least he’s thinking for himself now.”

A nod, and then the next words tumbled out almost on top of each other.

“If you took that thing out of his head, can you go in and fix mine? They - those things - they put something in there and I can’t make music any more.” He stopped, finished the last of his smoke. “I can play,” he added, more slowly, “but I can’t... make anything new.”

She leaned forward and cupped his cheek in the palm of her hand. “God Markus, I wish I could. And normally yeah, I’d be able to. But with this thing in my head I daren’t even try - it could fry my brain just for making the attempt. Vampires, see.”

For once, she felt bad about saying no. Markus’ eyes - that had begun to fill with hope - turned down once more, and he shook his head.

“I can’t stand it,” he said quietly, and she shuffled herself across the bunk, wrapped her arms around him. She wasn’t often moved to compassion, but the pain radiating from the big, gentle man was such that you would have to be made of stone to ignore it. And despite her many faults, stone she was not.

After a moment’s hesitation his arms crept up, and he hugged her back. They stayed like that, taking comfort from contact with someone who understood, until she drew back - with some reluctance; it would have been very easy to just curl up and go to sleep like that, and she knew she wasn’t the only one thinking that. Markus ducked his head, swiped the back of his hand across his eyes.

“You and Dirk still not talking?” he asked, and she sighed.

“’Fraid not. Shame, but there you go.”

Markus placed one hand on her knee, and they both stared at it before he turned to look into her eyes, and flicked his tongue across his lips, a nervous dart.

“He is a fool,” he said slowly, and Yoz’ eyes widened when she picked up the meaning hidden under the words. Sometimes being able to read minds, to understand the unspoken subtext, was incredibly useful; other times, like now, it just threatened to open up a whole fresh can of worms.

“Perhaps,” she told him, and took his hand in her own, lifted it to kiss his knuckles gently. “And now, I need some sleep. I expect you do, too.”

She wasn’t the only one that could read between the lines. He gave her a nod, and leaned forward to kiss her; she let him, and they relaxed into the action with no small enjoyment. He was a great kisser, she discovered; soft, full lips moved against her own with a delicacy that made her smile, and his tongue was gentle where it begged entrance. Her hand crept up to tangle in his curls, and she broke the contact with a sigh.

“Go,” she said, “now. Before I blow my cool completely and do something stupid.”

He grinned, gave her a quick peck on the cheek and slid out of the bunk. He leaned back in, took her hand and echoed her gesture of earlier, dropping a gentle kiss on the knuckles. She hissed at him with a smile, and he bade her goodnight before he sauntered off down the aisle of the bus.

Yoz tugged the black curtain across, lit herself a last cigarette, and turned off the light.

Markus? Well, she couldn’t deny he was interesting. His eyes had travelled across her skin more than once, and they’d passed several companionable hours discussing the art of tattooing. She’d seen his, and he’d seen some of hers; there had been the usual jokes about how far the ink went, but until tonight she’d never taken them seriously.

And she shouldn’t. The men had a hard enough time believing in her as it was, and if she began to hop from bunk to bunk she’d be seen as just another groupie, another body for them to use as they wished. And no matter how much fun that might be in the short term - she grinned at the darkness of the ceiling - it would make a difficult, messy situation even worse. And there would be fights, and arguing, and--

So no. Forget it.

Her mind began to drift in time with the coil of the cigarette smoke above her, its hypnotic movement with the slow airflow through the cramped space soothing to watch.

Markus. Nice solid body, long legs, and those gentle eyes of blue-grey; big hands, too. Big, flexible hands. Long fingers. Musician’s hands. Lover’s hands. Like Dirk’s, in a way, but not as slender; she wondered if they had callouses in different places, and how both sets of hands would feel roaming her body. Dirk with his smooth chest and lean, muscular arms in contrast to the heavier shapes of Markus’ body; curly hair and straight, two sets of blue-grey eyes to sparkle wickedly in the darkness.

Time for sleep. She shook herself, stubbed out her smoke, and curled up under the blanket. Just sleep, nothing extra-curricular tonight; she had to be careful where she let her mind wander, sometimes. In such close confines after a period of stress it was all too easy to link to other minds by mistake. 

She sat up, punched the pillow a couple of times, and curled up again. Just sleep. Nothing more.

She tried not to think about Dirk, and how her body missed him.

And then, of course, there was Markus.

Markus....

Yoz drifted off to sleep. And dreamed.

~*~

Dreaming minds make connections, sometimes. When there is talent then the normal human act of reaching out to another, that instinctive reaction that we are born with, can become something more. Dreams themselves can be far more solid than we realise, and we can be made vulnerable by our sleeping minds.

Tendrils of need tipped with lust wound like slender columns of smoke through the bus, touched the sleeping minds; some passed through with just a shift and a quiet moan, others clung for a moment until breath was caught and a sigh slipped free. But in two, the tendrils found a hold and burrowed deep, followed the path back to the source and twined together into a shared reverie of hedonistic desire, and the desperate, hungry need for relief.

_Softness of lips, and she feels a bolt of heat through her entire body when they meet. It’s been too long. He seems to feel the same way, because the cool tremble of his hands roams the furnace that is her skin; she’s on fire, the impatience within her making her restive. She wants him._

He turned over in his bunk, and his eyes roamed under their closed and fluttering lids. Sweat began to bead on his forehead, and the eroticism of the images in his sleeping mind drew a reaction from every cell of his body. He let out a moan on a long, wistful sigh, and dropped deeper into the dream.

_She is fire, and the cool length of his body against her makes her hunger to devour him. He kisses her, gently at first, but with increasing passion until he’s plundering her mouth with his tongue, the head of his cock rubbing wetness against her stomach._

_But they are not alone here._

_Another darkness, a broader shadow. A calloused hand trails up her spine, smooths along one shoulder; she tilts her head back to welcome the stranger and he lowers his mouth to her, a brush of full lips along hers, still swollen from the previous kiss._

Inside another darkened bunk someone else moaned into his pillow; his chest heaved with the deep breaths the sensation of the dream was driving him to. He clenched his teeth, writhed under the blanket; his curls stuck to his face, wet with sweat, and he groaned again. Heat ripped through his body, lust and desire holding his sleeping mind in their hot, dark grasp.

_She had them both now, two bodies pressed against her. She wanted them both, both of the cocks that nudged at her skin, both of the mouths that bit their way across her flesh, both sets of hands that grasped and stroked and squeezed._

_They changed places with a grin, pale skin sliding against her to give way to the shadows of the ink that coloured the other; she tangled her hands in smooth hair, arched back against the sweat-slick expanse of chest behind her to allow the other to kiss his way across her collarbone, and press his mouth to the heavy ache of her breasts._

Yoz hissed between her teeth, her hands roaming her body as she twisted in the grip in the dream. Echoes of her mind radiated out, and the air carried their soft cries along the aisle to each other. Their minds lost themselves in sensation even as their bodies contorted in their bunks, alone and yearning.

_They fell to the bed, individuals almost vanishing in the tangle of limbs and sweet hot lust. She felt teeth grasp the back of her neck and laughed, arched her back to press her flesh against his; the second man pressed to her front and bit her neck, long fingers active against her breasts, pulling and rolling her nipples until she wanted to scream._

_More fingers delved, these hands broader, and they caressed through her sex until she did scream against the skin of her lovers._

_His hair fanned glossy against the pillow when he laid back, pulled her over his smooth chest to kiss her again. She straddled his hips, leaned over to nuzzle at his face; the hands of her other lover - sprawled beside her, blue-grey eyes hot with desire - stroked along her spine, caressed from her shoulders to her buttocks._

_She slid down his body, took him into her mouth, suckled at the head of his cock while her hand caressed the shaft. He buried his hands in her hair, called out to her; the other turned himself around, began to bite and kiss his way over her hip. She moaned, the vibration bringing a rush of precome from his cock, lapped away by her eager tongue._

_The other nuzzled and stroked, positioned himself behind her, and began to drag his tongue along her slit. She moaned and thrust her hips back, ground herself onto his face, his lips, his questing fingers. He gathered all she had, tongue active and reaching, wriggling between the lips of her sex to draw more cries from her, more of her sweetness, more of the heat and the wanting._

_She couldn’t bear it any more, and pulled herself forward. She grabbed his hair, kissed him hard; then she reached back, and guided him into her. He bucked up with a curse when she tightened her muscles, gave her hips a wicked little shimmy; she arched her body, pinned his shoulders to the bed with her hands and licked at a nipple, a breath of cool air over it before she took it between her teeth. Tortured so sweetly, licked and sucked and drawn to a point she moved between them, laved them both with her tongue, bit at the skin in between, her own growls mixing with his high, breathy cries of wonder and lust._

The bunk shuddered with him, his hips thrusting against the thin mattress in an echo of the vivid scene that played itself out in his head. His moans and soft cries echoed through the cramped space, found their way out into the greater space beyond; they twined around the calls from the others, and teased the other sleepers with their passion.

_The other was not idle. He pressed against her, his thighs alongside hers, the broadness of his chest rough against the sweat slick skin of her back. Fingers found her other entrance, and she gasped, shuddered at the invasion; he nuzzled his lips under her ear, his breath harsh, and scissored his fingers inside her._

_The first lay quiescent; his long, slender fingers stroked her throat, her breasts, her belly. Both of them murmured low to her when he pushed inside, soothed her brief cry of pain with their desire._

It took him a moment to identify what had woken him. Even in his human form, Dani had better hearing than most humans; the next soft cry that reached his ears made him grin, the mystery cleared up. Typical of the Magus - couldn’t go long without, and so she’d finally given in and was--

But that didn’t make sense.

He stuck his head out of his bunk, and squinted into the dim orange glow of the nightlight. There was her billet, but the noises were coming from two other bunks, nowhere near her own. Giving up on sleep for the moment Dani swung his legs out of bed, and sat there for a minute to listen.

A long, whispered murmur of desire, the sound of a body that writhed in the small space of its bunk. He could even smell it; none of the humans would be able to - until the inevitable occurred, of course - but right now the whole place reeked of sex, of the sweat drawn by lust, of bodies that were lost in the throes of passion.

And it was getting worse; he slid from his bunk, adjusted his boxers over his half hard cock, and went to get himself a can of something... cold.

On his return he found he wasn’t the only one awake. Kai scowled up at the Magus’ curtain, but then must have figured out the same thing Dani had. He shot the drummer an amused glance, and vanished back into his own bed; from the sounds that came from there a moment or so later he’d obviously decided to put the lustful orchestra to good use.

“What the fuck?” muttered another voice, and Dani saw Sascha’s sleep-tousled head poking out from behind his own curtain. 

“Exactly,” replied Dani with a grin. 

The bruises Yoz had inflicted on him earlier had matured beautifully, and right now Sascha looked like a gargoyle; one eye had swollen shut, and his cheekbone smudged with shades of purple and blue that promised to bloom with all sorts of pretty shades as it healed.

“But,” he added, and twisted his head to identify the source of the moans and whimpers. “Eh?”

“Weird, isn’t it?” grinned the drummer, and with a shake of his head and a quiet goodnight Sascha retreated in confusion. Dani had just hoisted himself up to his bunk when another head poked out, this one with a curse hissed between gritted teeth.

“What’s going on?” Weiki asked, the ice blue of one of his glares sweeping the curtained bunks. From the noises that were now coming from behind several curtains it sounded as though there wasn’t much sleeping going on right now.

“I think she’s dreaming,” suggested Dani helpfully, and was rewarded with a growl.

“What, like buy one dream get two free? That’s _insane_.” 

“No boss,” replied Dani with a grin. “That’s magic. Sleep well.”

And with that he rolled into his own blankets, his curtain tugged across with a whoosh to hide the choked laughter. Well, if everyone else was doing it - and he couldn’t deny the erotic potential in the soundshow still being throatily performed across the aisle - then why fight it?

He slid his hand down to caress his own hardon, and sighed. Sounds and smells of sex tickled his senses, and before long he was as lost in the lustful haze as every other greedy listener.

Weiki muttered under his breath, then smiled as an idea occurred to him. He rummaged through the bag stowed under his bunk, chuckled when his fingers closed around the small mini disc player. Because it didn’t just play; oh no, it was a very clever piece of equipment, and it could record as well.

Chuckling evilly, he set the microphone up, and tried to get back to sleep.

_Three bodies locked together, her hips pushed back onto one before thrusting forward to impale herself upon the other. The darker of her lovers pressed her down, snarled into her neck; the lighter one gripped her hips so hard that his nails left crescent marks in the hot sweat of her skin._

_They could feel each other inside her; the heads of their cocks nuzzled together, separated only by a thin layer of yielding skin. She could feel the pulse and the heat of them, and knew from their gasped cries that they couldn’t hold out for much longer._

_She flung back her head when her own frame surrendered to the shudders that built from her spine to wrack her entire body. One more thrust, and she stiffened between them, the fire that had built from the very beginning bursting from every nerve, every cell, every part of her body alight with the scream of climax._

_Her dark lover cried out, ground his hips against her, filled her with the heat of his seed; the pale form of her first lover arched with a shriek, his own body driven to shatter by the throb and the heat of her, driven down onto him with such force. They writhed, gripped by the waves that boomed across their minds, blinded by the rush of light and heat that made them into one creature of sensation, of desire, of passion._

_And then they fell, tumbled to the sweat-damp sheets to tangle shaky limbs and murmur into skin soaked by the heat of their arousal._

_Lips now gentle, soft kisses on sated skin. Sleep called, and with a final murmur to each other all three heeded the siren song, and spiralled down into the velvet dark._

__

~~tbc~~


	13. Twelve

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They backed up until they were huddled against the wall, a cold feeling of dread sinking icy talons into their flesh. Far from being about to escape, they were, in fact, trapped.

_****_

Chapter Twelve

There were entirely too many smug expressions around the place this morning for Yoz’ liking.

She made herself comfortable by one of the lounge tables, and stared out of the bus window at the scenery as they approached Rome. Then she fought down the desire to just invade somebody’s head to find out what the hell was going on. Yes, it would be easier like that, but it was... well, rude.

Markus had his suspicions too, from his expression when he shambled down the stairs and lined up by the coffee machine. Whispers and sly little sideways glances had her grinding her teeth, but it wasn’t until the lounge was almost full of people that nursed coffees, cigarettes and - in one or two cases - hangovers that Dani poked his head over the back of his seat and grinned at the Magus.

She watched him warily over the rim of her mug.

“You dream very loudly,” he said, and her eyes widened as the meaning of his words sank in. Oh dear. Nice as the dream had been, she hadn’t realised that--

Dammit. 

“Mind you,” he added to Markus, who was trying to hide a smile in his coffee, “so do you.”

Yoz plonked her elbows on the table, and buried her face in her hands. They were all up now, making sure that they could see her and Markus... and, of course, one other. 

Dirk, who found the whole thing bitterly amusing from his seat over in the corner with Kai and Henjo, jumped when Dani turned and levelled a finger at him. “And you’re the worst of the lot,” he said, and shook the finger for good measure. Dirk blushed to the roots of his hair when Markus eyed him; Yoz just kept her face in her hands, and sighed.

“Oh God,” she said, to the vast amusement of those closest.

“So you said last night,” Weiki piped up, and she opened her fingers a crack to glare at him in deep suspicion. He fiddled with a small mini disc player, attached it to a set of travel speakers; the sniggering going on around him boded ill for the three people who now blushed hard enough to heat up a small city.

Andi hurried down the stairs, plonked himself down in the seat next to Weikath and grinned. 

Markus groaned. 

“Now I know we’re in trouble,” he muttered with a sheepish glance at the Magus, now face down on the table, “he never gets up before lunchtime when we’re on tour.”

The long groan - unmistakably Markus - that emerged through the speakers had everyone going into fits of laughter; they clung to each other and hooted when Dirk’s voice made an appearance, and when the Magus herself could be heard adding her breathy cries to the mix they lost it completely. 

“You evil bastard, Weikath,” grumbled Dirk and glared at the table top, unable to hide a small smile when Yoz was heard to praise the hardness of the dicks she could feel, albeit only in her dreams.

Markus, face flat on the table with his arms over his head, could only find it in himself to moan.

“It was a very detailed dream,” said Andi sweetly, a moment before Markus’ voice made an observation as to how the Magus’ ass felt around him. Dirk put his hands over his ears and shut his eyes when his own voice, blurred with sleep, lovingly detailed just how tight--

“Turn it off, Weikath,” growled the Magus, and directed a glare at him that would have been much more effective had she not been as red as a beetroot.

He made a great show of searching for the off button, only to find it after a particularly loud trio of bestial groans and one shriek reduced the already howling crowd to further paroxysms. 

“All we need now is the visual to go with it,” gasped Sascha from the floor, “and we’ll make a fortune!”

Markus kicked him, eliciting a yelp before he rolled out of range.

“I want to know how they managed to do it in three separate bunks,” deadpanned Henjo, as he disentangled himself from Kai. He was fighting for breath, laughing so hard he’d about choked.

“Sheer force of personality, perhaps?” Andi suggested.

“Bastards,” muttered Markus, and Yoz patted his shoulder with a huff.

“Sorry mate. I guess my dreams can get a bit--”

“Intense?”

“Noisy?”

“Public?” finished Weiki, and wiggled his eyebrows at her with a grin. She flicked a toast crust at him and snorted.

“Markus is right, you are a bastard. Look, I’m sorry about that - I guess I wasn’t shielding my thoughts as well as I should have been.”

“No shit,” groused Dirk, but when she glanced across at him he shot her a quick wink. Her heart lifted; maybe he wouldn’t forgive her, but it looked as though negotiations could be resumed.

“Markus _and_ Dirk though?” grinned Dani, and she groaned for the wicked twinkle in his eye. “You have no shame, woman.”

“Oh, fuck you.”

“Me too? You’re insatiable! Anyway, I don’t do public sex.”

“Fuck. You.”

Markus grabbed her cigarettes, and pinched one between his teeth.

“Yoz?” he said quietly, and when she rolled her head to the side to meet his embarrassed gaze he gave her a grave nod. “Today is going to be a very long day,” he told her in all seriousness, and through the whistles and catcalls of the vastly amused crowd she had to agree with him.

~*~

At least she could escape it. As soon as the buses had pulled into the venue and the process of unloading equipment had begun Weiki was on the other bus, mini disc player in hand, and the howls of laughter that emerged from that direction left absolutely no doubt what he was up to. Dirk joined Yoz where she stood beside the bus, scowling toward the hysteria.

“What happened?” he asked her, and she lifted one shoulder in a shrug.

“I was thinking about you and Markus and it kind of - slipped a bit,” she told him with a sigh, then tilted her head to look up at him. “Sorry. Really. That wasn’t supposed to happen.”

He shook his head and leaned back against the bus, regarded her soberly. “Well, it was a very nice dream.”

“Nice? Just nice?”

The sound of recorded moans echoed through the building, and she slapped one hand over her eyes even as he blushed again. “OK,” he admitted, “a bit more than nice. Look, can we talk?”

She slid her hand down, and stared at him over the top of it. “Maybe later,” she said, eventually. “Rome’s always had a good population of ‘shifters - and vampires, like most ancient places - so I’m off out to see what I can find. And,” she added with a wince as a fresh burst of hilarity could be heard from the other bus, “stay out of the way of that bloody lot.”

“Wise move,” he replied gloomily, and she patted him on the shoulder before going to fetch the items she would need for the search. “Very wise move indeed.”

~*~

She didn’t return until just before the buses left, her frustration evident on her face. Dirk and Markus had been ragged to the point that both men had become rather surly about the whole dream business; the continued delight that their colleagues took in listening to the recording over and again had worn their nerves to a nub. The one bright spot was that Sascha appeared to be talking to Dani; however, whether they would ever be close again was a question that only time would answer.

The sound of recorded moans had begun to drift through the lounge once more, which drove a curse from Markus and a groan from Dirk. Yoz looked up from where she scribbled something on a piece of paper, and scowled across the lounge.

“Haven’t you had enough of that yet?” she snapped.

“Of what?” asked Weiki, his expression impish. “it’s just porn. Pretty good porn, too - listen.”

And with that, he turned it up. 

She narrowed her eyes for a moment, and the recording ground to a halt with an electronic burp followed by a crackle of static. Weiki yelped, examined his precious gadget carefully before he shot a deadly glare at the Magus; she just cocked an eyebrow and shrugged. “Delicate things, those players - sounds like one bit’s welded itself to another bit inside. Piss poor workmanship if you ask me.”

“Thank you,” Markus murmured as Weiki stomped off upstairs to the other lounge in a huff, and she winked. He watched her go back to her scribbling for a moment, then cleared his throat. Mismatched eyes flicked up in a wry glance, then she returned to her work.

“Out with it,” she said, although the squeak of the pen never paused.

He sighed, and beckoned to someone; when Dirk joined them she laid her pen down, and laced her fingers together on the table in front of her. They both looked at her, but neither one seemed to have any idea what to say.

“I assume,” she said quietly, “that this is about last night?”

They exchanged a quick glance. “We were wondering,” Dirk began, then seemed to run out of words.

“How much of it was just, well, you,” finished Markus, and then they both went quiet again.

She cocked her head, and smiled. Their uncertainty rolled off them in waves; she could lie and tell them that it was all her, they’d done nothing but been observers despite their presence in the picture, but that wouldn’t be true. And if nothing else, she owed them both honesty - if only because she’d vanished to let them take them the ragging alone all day.

“Well,” she drawled, “from what I can figure out,” and she tapped the piece of paper in front of her, “and bearing in mind that I was frustrated and tired when I went to bed last night--”

“Quit stalling,” muttered Dirk, and she pushed her fingers through her fringe with a sigh.

“I was horny and I was thinking of you two. OK? And when I started to dream I made a connection. With you guys.”

Markus nodded. “So you _were_ thinking of us,” he said, the slightest suggestion of self-satisfaction touching his features.

“Ah, don’t be getting all smug there, big Yin,” she snorted. “I only managed to make the connection because you two were thinking of me. Had you been thinking of someone else, or not having lustful thoughts at all then the connection would never have been made.”

The men studiously avoided looking at each other.

“And once the connection was made, well,” and she went back to making random scribbles on the paper, the scratch of the pen loud between the three, “you had as much control over the direction of the dream as I did.”

“Oh,” said Markus.

“So did we actually--” began Dirk, then stopped to clear his throat. She laughed, and reached across to pat his hand.

“Well, that depends on how you look at it,” she replied. “On the one hand, there was at least six feet of space between our bodies at all times. On the other, yes, at some level, all three of us had consensual sex.”

“And Weiki recorded it,” grumbled Markus, and she grinned.

“Yeah, but his player’s bust. It won’t happen again. I mean,” she hastened to add at the sudden sharp glances that were shot at her from across the table, “if it happens again. Not necessarily with me. Or just me and - shut up Dirk, it isn’t funny.”

Markus rested his elbow on the table, cupped his cheek in his hand, and gave her a lopsided grin. “So would you do it again?” he asked, “for real?”

“Ah,” she said, and eyed Dirk. He folded his hands on the table, and the smirk he sent her was no help at all. “Well. It would depend on the circumstances, I guess.”

“Neat answer,” Dani broke in, from where he’d appeared over the back of her seat. She reached up and tweaked his nose.

“Shut up Fieval. And on that note, gents, I’m off to bed.”

“Coward,” said Dani, and she flipped him off even as she shot off up the stairs, seeking her bunk and a little peace from blue-grey eyes that read her very well indeed, thank you.

~*~

Paris was wet, crowded and dirty, as ever. Yoz eyed the weather, had a quick scan of their surroundings and asked the guys to wake her if anything interesting happened. Then she went back to sleep, but only after setting some rather nasty wards on the curtain of her bunk. Her Dirk had to wake her before the show to ask her to remove the fast-growing boils from underneath the fingernails of Tobi, Eggi and Dirk, all three of them looking rather sheepish when she did so. She also spent some time healing Sascha so that he could at least see out of both eyes; he didn’t have a lot to say, but did give her a hug when the healing was done.

By the time she woke up again they were on the road, the steady rumble of the bus wheels a comforting background thrum of white noise. She relaxed, let her mind spread out; all was well on both buses, although a tiny flare at the edge of her attention did make her smile.

They were being watched, and the signature was so familiar Yoz didn’t even have to see it fully to recognise it.

 _Hands off, bitch_ , she thought cheerfully, then turned over and went back to sleep.

~*~

At least they were back in a hotel this time, and as soon as the room allocations were out she pocketed her key and headed for the door, determination in every line of her frame.

“Where are you going?” asked Kai, and she spun on her heel. The glare she shot at him had him leaning back into Henjo, a little surprised; she’d been stable of temperament for a while, so the sudden aggression startled him.

Not as much as the quick kiss on the lips and wink did, though.

“Out,” she grinned. “I’m going to get to the bottom of this if it kills me. And I have a distinct feeling that something is going to happen here.”

“What’s going to happen here?”

She shrugged. “Dunno. Exciting, eh?”

Henjo and Kai watched her leave the lobby, hands in her pockets and whistling.

“That,” said Kai with a shake of his head, “is one weird woman.”

~*~

Dawn had just begun to break over the city as she strolled through the quiet alleys and back ways, senses alert for anything unusual. Madrid being somewhat further south than some of their recent shows the temperature was mild, if rather less than balmy; the sky was streaked with salmon pinks and peach, and all in all it looked as though it was going to be a beautiful day.

That was when she picked up a brief whiff of the trail she was so desperate to find, and a grin crept across her face.

Screw that - it was about to be a _wonderful_ day.

~*~

It was early evening when Dirk’s mobile rang, and when he fished in his pocket to retrieve it he gave a snort. Obvious who it was; nobody else could make the screen say _pick the phone up, asshole_ when it rang.

“Yoz,” he said, and Kai looked up from his beer, eyebrow raised. Most of the three bands were relaxing in the hotel bar, although some had gone for a wander around the new city. 

“Dirk,” she said, and the excitement in her voice had him smiling. She hadn’t been this enthused about anything for a while. “I’ve got her, got the bitch in a corner. I need you to grab a couple of the guys and come meet me - Tobi and Felix for preference, Dani too. Henjo and Kai - I’m going to need them. Here, come to--” and she rattled off an address, which had him tapping the bar to get the attention of the barman so he could borrow a pen.

He scribbled the address on a beermat, and nodded when she repeated it.

“I’ll try,” he said, “but what if they can’t-- Yoz?”

Dead air greeted his query; she’d hung up. 

Kai eyed him, and he shoved the phone back in his pocket with a sigh. “She wants me to bring you and Henjo to her--”

“Can’t,” said Kai with a shrug. “Me and Henjo have a phone interview in - shit, half an hour. Where is he? I gotta find him...” and with that he downed his beer, slid from his barstool and vanished in search of Henjo. 

Dirk scratched his ear. Marvellous. Well, best see what the others were up to, then.

Tobi and Felix had gone out, and none of the others wanted to come with him; Markus had shut himself in his room to try and work on something - anything - new, and wouldn’t answer his phone. Weiki still sulked over the destruction of his mini disc player, and Dirk knew that asking Sascha would be a waste of time. Thankfully he found Dani - chatting up the barmaid - and explained the situation to him as fast as he could.

With a shrug and a wink at the pretty girl behind the bar, Dani followed Dirk across the lounge to grab their jackets; there was nothing else going on tonight, the gig wasn’t happening until tomorrow so agreeing to follow the fretful bassist sounded better than an evening vegetating in the hotel.

“She say what was happening?”

Dirk shrugged into his jacket and grumbled. “No. Well, something about cornering the bitch, but that was all.”

“Cornering?” Dani hesitated, and shoved his hands deeper into the pockets of his jeans. “Dirk, do you know how dangerous people can be when they’re cornered?”

“Yeah, I do,” he replied, then plucked at his companion’s sleeve. “And I know how dangerous Yoz can be when she’s kept waiting, so let’s go.”

~*~

Full dark in the back alleys of Madrid, and Yoz crouched on top of the snaggle toothed top of an old stone wall, eyes and ears and other, more esoteric senses on high alert. She knew that Dirk would be able to find her; between what the demon had left behind and their own peculiar link of affection he could find her in the dark at the bottom of a coal mine, she suspected.

Of course, once this was over she was going to have to do something about that, but right now--

Scrabble of fingers beside her, and the two men helped each other up to join her. She eyed them and pulled a face.

“No Kai?”

“Thanks a lot,” muttered Dirk, and she pinched his arm gently.

“Sorry. Right, up there,” and she pointed up to the lit window of an apartment, “is a small family of wolves.”

“I thought wolves usually stuck to the countryside?” said Dani with a frown, and she shrugged.

“I know the Iberian wolves have to be a bit more careful - with the amount of hunting that goes on here they’re actually safer in the cities. Anyway, I know she’s going to be coming for them and there’s only one way in and out of that block.”

A bottle clinked, further down the alley, and a derelict coughed in his sleep. Dani wrinkled his nose.

“Nice neighbourhood.”

“Exactly why she’s coming here,” whispered Yoz, eyes alight with fierce anticipation. “And when she shows up I’m going to nail her skinny arse to the nearest wall. What’s in the bag, Dirk?”

He grinned, and unzipped the top of the backpack to show her. “If any vampires show up, they’re going to find me ready,” he said firmly, and she chuckled at the solid clink of the wooden stakes he’d thought to bring with him.

“Trust a German to remember all the details,” she whispered, and he stuck his tongue out at her. Dani snorted, and hopped down behind the wall. Dirk passed him the bag when he whispered a demand for it, and peered down curiously when rustling sounds indicated that the other man was - for some reason - getting undressed behind the cover of tumbled bricks and blocks of stone.

“What are you doing?”

Some more rustling, and the shape of the were rat jumped back up to crouch beside him, passed the bag back.

“Jeans are in the bag,” he rumbled with a wink, “means when I change back I don’t have to run around stark naked.”

The Magus chuckled. “Good plan - but you kept the jacket on?”

He turned the edge of it back, showed her that he’d stuffed a couple of stakes into an inside pocket. “Need the storage space,” he grinned.

Further banter was interrupted by a burst of gunfire from above, and all three froze for a second. Then the screaming started - the bass roar of a man, followed by a woman, then several children’s voices - and Yoz was off the wall and running for the door.

“Wait!” yelled Dirk, but she ignored him; the two men exchanged a quick glance and followed her, Dirk having to take a little more care when he scrambled down, as opposed to Yoz and Dani who had just leaped. An explosion signalled Yoz’ destruction of the door, and she raced up the stairs bellowing Vega’s name. Getting her to wait wasn’t an option, so with a muttered curse Dani and Dirk followed her.

~*~

They soon spotted which apartment she’d been heading for; even if the shouts and screams hadn’t shown them the splintered door most certainly would have. The stairwell was dark, lightbulbs smashed, and smelled of piss and damp; mould fragranced the walls with its uniquely dreary odour, and overall Dirk thought that this was the last place on earth he would have expected to find wolves.

When they burst into the apartment they couldn’t see their Magus, but they were faced with several bodies; a man and a woman had been cut to pieces by gunfire, and the stench of their violent death hit both men in the face like a swung plank. Dani growled, ducked his head; the smell of blood made him grind his teeth, and he wanted nothing more than to either join in the destruction - or feed. Dirk turned, tried to home in on where the bangs and crashes that indicated where the current battle took place were coming from.

“There!” he yelled, and took off toward the back of the apartment. Dani, every hair along his neck and back standing straight up, shook his head and followed him. There was another smell here - several other smells - that he knew he should identify, that were important, but between the blood and the violence he couldn’t quite focus enough to do so.

“Fuck it,” he snapped, and charged off after Dirk.

Yoz and Vega were fighting tooth and nail in what was clearly a child’s bedroom; an older girl shielded a toddler and a baby with her body and begged for them to stop, not to hurt her, to let the children go. Furniture lay in splinters, and the impeccably dressed sorceress bore several marks of violence along the pale skin of her arms and across her cheeks. Yoz was all over her, a snarling bundle of absolute hatred, but neither woman appeared to be using magic.

Dirk ducked around the whirling battle, went to the aid of the girl. His plan was to get the children away, out from under the nose of the woman who wanted to kill them all. 

He never even considered that he might be in danger, so when the teenager shivered into the form of a huge wolf he still reached out, meaning to grab one of the children, then gather them both to him and run. She must have thought that he meant them harm, because her lunge took her straight across the two screaming infants and slammed directly into his chest.

Dani jumped at her, knocked her away before she could rip out his throat; Vega turned Yoz, locked one slender forearm across her throat.

“Dear oh dear,” she hissed, her lip swelling where Yoz had got a least one good shot in. “How naughty.”

Then she angled the machine pistol that she held in her free hand, and shot the two children to pieces while Dani and the wolf fought in the other corner. The bellow of the gun grabbed their attention, brought them both around with a shriek; the wolf froze, stared at the torn and bloody bodies of what were presumably her siblings, then launched herself at Vega.

Who laughed, and vanished with the Magus still locked against her body.

The wolf hit the wall, bounced back; she yelped, then turned to nose at the two pathetic bundles that the sorceress had left behind, a pitiful whine coming from her throat. She shifted, her form shading to the halfway shape that could speak, murmured something in Spanish over the tiny bodies, her voice breaking even as fat tears rolled down her muzzle. Dani pushed himself up with a groan, and went to comfort her. Too late; this time when she looked up her eyes were full of fury and the madness of grief.

He braced himself for her attack, but it wasn’t him that she launched herself at.

Dirk’s scream when her jaws closed on his side hurt Dani’s ears, and she snarled through the mouthful of flesh that she ground her teeth into. He beat her on the head, writhed and yelled and fought but until the rat barrelled into them both he got nowhere. By the time he’d hauled her off Dirk had several huge tears along his side, hip and leg, and was losing a lot of blood, hands and arms covered in gore from where he tried to stem the crimson tide. She shook herself free of the rat, spat in Dirk’s direction, and began to berate them in Spanish.

Dani waved his hands. “I don’t understand! Do you speak English? Shit. Shit!”

“Shit is right,” gurgled another voice from the doorway, and both men swore. 

_Vampire._

~*~

The wolf launched herself at the crooked figure, but didn’t get very far. He caught her in his claws, held her struggling body up, then with great deliberation leaned forward to bare his fangs - and tore her throat out. He spent a little longer breaking the body into pieces, tossed them at the man and the rat whilst he grinned at them; neither one could move, frozen to the spot with fear.

There were further noises from behind the vampire in the doorway, more whimpers from another room. It glanced back, and that was when Dani jumped.

He slammed the stake through the centre of the vampire’s chest, dropped it and shoved past even as the creature writhed around the wood, its form breaking into ashes before he was all the way past. Long fingers closed around Dirk’s wrist and he found himself pulled to his feet, balancing on his good leg and trying very, very hard not to faint.

“We have to get out of here,” growled the rat, and the pair of them began to hobble toward the door.

They didn’t quite make it, a door to another bedroom almost torn from its hinges to disgorge a cloud of shrieking predators to dive at them. Dani dropped Dirk and leaped, a whirlwind of teeth and claws that kept them away from the injured human; past the ferocious battle that was demolishing whatever was left of the tiny apartment Dirk saw a bed, and two bound forms lying on it.

His own darkness stirred, and he didn’t try to fight it when it burst from its hiding place and drove him forward.

~*~

Felix growled deep in his throat, and watched the vampire. He and Tobi had been dragged here earlier in the afternoon, ambushed while they strolled the streets of the old town; the family that lived in the dingy, tiny apartment - ‘shifters all, from what he could see - had been held by men and women with guns in the main living area until dark, which is when the vampires had turned up.

He had no idea who the hell these people were, except that the two of them had been told that any attempt to change form would be met with deadly force. And from the eager grin on the face of the man that had told them this, neither one had any reason to doubt it.

Later, of course, things had become a little clearer with the arrival of the sorceress. Although he’d heard Yoz and some of the others talk about Vega, this was the first time he’d seen her; he knew she was tall, but he’d been unprepared for the sheer size and overwhelming magnetism of the woman that strode into the room, grabbed his chin and tilted his face toward her. Her smile, although beautiful, was cold; she’d examined both men thoroughly, then left the room with nothing more than a comment over her shoulder that if they behaved themselves, they might live.

Then the killing had started, and Felix began to seriously doubt that either one of them was going to get out of this with their hides intact.

Worse than the anticipation was the not knowing; the door had been smashed in, that they’d heard, and it was definitely their Magus’ voice that rang through the apartment with fury. Other voices, more gunfire; the shriek of death and then the vampires were moving, bursting from the room to attack whoever had come with Yoz.

Tobi, laid next to him on the bed, fought his bonds; the one vampire that had been assigned to watch over them when the others left the room crouched over him, nuzzled its dreadful face closer to his friend, and licked the side of his face. Tobi’s eyes went wide, and he froze; the vampire glanced at Felix, winked, ran its dry tongue over thin, blackened lips.

“You next,” it snickered, skinned back its lips from its fangs--

\--and vanished in a cloud of rank dust that had them both sneezing. The bed bounced with the impact of another body; hands, warm, human hands pulled at the rope that bound them, loosened the gags, assisted them to sit up.

“The fuck are you doing here?” asked Dirk, and Tobi shook himself.

“Long story,” he replied. From the room outside they heard a squeal; Dani was just about holding his own against three or four vampires - with the speed of the melee it was hard to tell - and despite the rat’s skill and ferocity he was going to lose. Unless he had help.

Only taking the time to check that Dirk would be OK, both of the cats changed form, stripped the remnants of their torn clothing away from themselves, and dived into the fray.

~*~

_I’m going to die_ , Dani thought as he felt claws rip at his back, _I’m all alone and I’m going to die...._

A furred shoulder pushed him aside, and he hit the ground with a startled squeak; two half-shifted cats battled the pair of vampires that remained, and he felt Dirk’s hands wrap around his arms, begin to help him to his feet. 

“Where’s the bag?”

“What? Why?”

“Stakes, idiot,” he snarled, and almost bowled the injured human over in his dash to retrieve the slender wooden spikes that they needed. Once he had them he jumped back in to assist the two other ‘shifters, and in moments the vampires were nothing but a cloud of dirty grime that settled over the wreckage and the blood like a shroud.

The four took a moment to rest; Dirk allowed himself to lie flat on the floor, and when the sharp nose of the concerned rat appeared in his field of vision he smiled. It was very weird to see something that could appear so savage, and feel relieved about it--

“Don’t you pass out on me,” he said, and smiled at Dirk’s answering laugh, even if it was weak.

Tobi came across and kneeled next to him. “Hey. Thanks for staking that bloodsucker,” he said, and gripped Dirk’s shoulder in one taloned hand; he yelped, his entire body sore and bruised from the pounding the wolf had given him. Over his head the three ‘shifters exchanged glances; the bleeding from the wounds had stopped, and they appeared to be scabbing over at an acclerated rate.

Which was a good thing. In a way. The rate he’d been losing blood, he could well have been dead before they could get to help.

But in another way, it created a whole new set of problems. Because his system was behaving like that of a shapeshifter, not of a human; which meant that there was a good chance that his system had become infected, just as their own had. 

They wouldn’t find out until the next full moon, though, and right now they had to move. Felix and Tobi got him to his feet, and the four began to make their way - cautiously - out of the building. Dani stuck his nose out of the broken door first, eyed the alley, then sidled out. So far, so good.

Dirk, still supported between the furred shoulders of the cats, fumbled in his pocket. To his delight, his mobile was whole, unbroken, and had a good signal; he began to call up Kai’s number, thinking that he could borrow a car and come and get them. They staggered down the alley until a soft thump behind them froze all four on the spot.

“Leaving so soon?” hissed a voice.

They backed up until they huddled against the wall, a cold feeling of dread sinking icy talons into their flesh. Far from being about to escape, they were, in fact, trapped.

The alley was full of vampires.

_~~tbc~~_


	14. Thirteen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In the background Kai could hear shrieks and screams, thumps and crashes and all the noises one would expect to hear from a particularly nasty urban battle.

_****_

Chapter Thirteen

As soon as they arrived she fell to her knees, hard. The sorceress gave her a kick in the side, and stalked away; Yoz remained curled up in a ball while the click-click-click of Vega’s high heeled boots paced around her. Eyes still shut she analysed what she could of the surroundings without visual, and came to the conclusion that at some point it had served a medical function.

There was the faint tang of disinfectant, although much overlaid with damp and must. Unused facility, perhaps? And there was the faint susurrus of people, lots of them, and the far off clangs and bangs of movement. The floor? Cold and hard. Tiled, from the feel of it. And the light? Bright, if the pink glow behind her eyelids was anything to go by. Clinically bright.

And it was quite a large space; the echo of the sorceress’ heels told her that, the echoes that bounced back from the far walls giving her a good idea of how far she might have to sprint if she got the chance.

“Open your eyes, Magus,” snapped the other woman, “we don’t have all day.” 

Yoz, prepared now, did so.

In many ways she’d been right. It did appear to be a disused medical facility, although the implements hanging on the wall did give her some extra clues as to exactly what sort of medical facility. 

No general hospital this; no, the shackles, straps and straitjackets indicated an altogether darker purpose, and when Yoz shuffled herself around to eye the other woman she wasn’t entirely shocked to discover that she looked as though she’d fit right in with the former occupants.

Seated on what appeared to be an electric chair, upholstered with tattered velvet and hanging scraps of grubby lace, Vega spread her long arms and smiled at the Magus beatifically.

“Welcome,” she said, “to Bedlam.”

She crossed her legs, and now the smile had vanished.

“Welcome home.”

~*~

Bedlam indeed, thought Yoz as she was dragged - firmly encased in a construction of canvas and leather straps that would take her quite some time to escape - from what her insane adversary regarded as her throne room to her private quarters. They traversed long corridors, all tiled in blinding white, each one lined with barred steel doors; most of the doors stood open, and although many of the padded rooms revealed were empty, some were not.

These, thought Yoz as she glimpsed scenes of debauchery and gross vileness that turned even her cast iron stomach, must be the sort of henchmen that Vega was reduced to. The human ones, at any rate; the stink of vampire was everywhere, and the two dour young men that half carried, half dragged her behind the triumphant woman were certainly bloodsuckers.

No bad thing, she thought with a wince. Some of Vega’s human echelon clearly couldn’t be trusted with prisoners; the fact that she’d just spotted some of them tearing the flesh from a bound and still quivering form showed that.

How long the place had been abandoned she couldn’t tell. The psychic overflow of the maniacs Vega had filled the place with overwhelmed any imprint the former occupants may have left behind, and she found herself actually hoping that Henjo never found the place. What it would do to his mind if he opened himself to it didn’t bear thinking about - so she stowed that thought and began to worry about herself instead.

And not Dirk and not Dani, who were probably already dead and at least out of the reach of the insane woman that now watched her with a bright smile.

Hopefully, anyway.

She wondered just how bad things had to be when you hoped that friends were dead; well, bad enough that you were strapped into a straitjacket at the mercy of a sorceress not dealing from a full deck, vampires, and whatever dreck they’d managed to dig up along the way. Not her finest hour, that was for damn sure.

The two vampires that had dumped her in the middle of the thick rug bowed and withdrew, and she heard the click of a key in the lock.

“Locked in with me?” she said, raised an eyebrow in sarcastic surprise. Vega crossed the room, and to Yoz’ astonishment knelt next to her and began to unbuckle the straps of the straitjacket. 

“I can get out any time I like,” said the sorceress, and Yoz hummed in agreement. Considering her own strengths, though, it still seemed that Vega was taking a hell of a chance. “You, though, would be well advised not to try,” she added with a smirk.

The Magus got to her feet, rubbed her wrists where the straps had been pulled tight. “Go on then, tell me why not,” she said, her tone level. If Vega wanted to keep this civil she was all for that; right up until she saw her chance for escape, and then she was going to take the other woman’s spleen for a souvenir.

Vega tapped the side of her own head, and winked. “The worm,” she said. “You get out of this room and there’s vampires right outside - and it’ll burn out your brain before you can do anything about it. And even if you got through those two, there’s more.”

“I wait until daylight?” suggested Yoz.

“The wards - no pun intended,” smiled the other woman, “around this place will allow nothing warm blooded in, or out. I can pass through, of course, but by the time you’d figured them out my army would have caught you. And you don’t want to play with them, believe me. Tea?”

Yoz wrung one hand across the back of her neck, and blew out a long sigh of resignation. For the moment, she’d be best served by an attempt to discover just what this madwoman wanted, and then using that information to escape. 

“Please. Nice and strong, two sugars.”

The sorceress pulled a face as she prepared the drinks, and Yoz took the opportunity to look around with some interest. Vega’s living space here wasn’t so very different from the one she’d had in the Illuminati base in Antarctica. Which was to say, heavy on the scarlet drapes and thick rugs, tapestries and rich fabrics wherever you looked. Opulence was her thing, by all appearances, and through a distant door she could see a similarly richly appointed bedroom. 

Not so much as a paperback book, though, and Yoz felt a pang for the simple layout of her own room.

“Come, sit,” said Vega, and waved Yoz to a thick, comfortable sofa. 

Still wearing the blood and injuries of their latest battle the two women settled in, watched each other like wary cats. Yoz, despite her determination to remain civil, could take it no more; her voice was harsh with repressed tension when she spoke, anger that she’d kept leashed for far too long.

“Enough of this idiocy! You’ve killed two of my friends, hurt God alone knows how many more and done your level fucking best to kill me - and now we sit here taking tea like old friends?”

Vega shrugged. “For the moment, I win. So what’s the point in doing you further harm?”

“For the moment, fine. But just as soon as I get the chance I’m pulling your brain out through your _fucking hell stop it that hurts!_ ”

The other woman had murmured a string of words, gestured with her long, elegant fingers; she paused in her magic weaving to examine her nails a little more closely. A brief tut that indicated her displeasure at finding one of the scarlet talons cracked was the only noise she made, unlike the Magus now howling on the rug.

A word, a brush of those fingers and the pain stopped.

“Fuck,” croaked Yoz, when she finally managed to flip herself on to her back. A rill of blood had made its way down her chin where she’d bitten through her lip in her agony; Vega knelt beside her, dabbed at it with a soft white handkerchief.

“You see, I have also been fortunate enough to gain the access codes to the worm. So it really will pay you to listen to me, won’t it? I would be very sorry to see you die without the chance to get to know you better. It’s up to you, really.”

She hooked her fingers above Yoz’ face, and now her voice was as cold as a glacial wind.

“Live? Or die?”

“Fine,” grumbled the Magus, quite content to stay on the nice thick rug for a bit, at least until the thumping harmonics of the worm’s attack went away. “Whatever. You win, OK?”

And at the sound of the defeat in her enemy’s voice, the sorceress was content.

~*~

Kai’s heels rang across the lobby of the hotel. He was not at all amused, and when he found out just who had given him the wrong information--

His pocket buzzed, and he pulled up with a snarl. Perhaps he could take it out on whoever was calling him.

Henjo caught him up, puffing slightly.

“Kai, maybe it was just a mistake--”

He waved him to silence, and answered his phone. “Dirk! What the fuck--”

The voice was frantic, and in the background Kai could hear shrieks and screams, thumps and crashes and all the noises one would expect to hear from a particularly nasty urban battle. Dirk’s words were gabbled out almost too fast to follow, but the meaning was all too clear.

“Get out here now! We need to be picked up - Yoz is gone and we’re pinned - Dani! Up there! Kai, hurry!”

Eyes wide with shock Kai sprinted for the bar, still keeping the connection open. Henjo was a breath behind him, both men skidding to a halt once they reached the bar; of their colleagues there were only a few present, and Kai shot off to write down the directions Dirk gave him before he promised to come as fast as he could. Henjo had made his way over to where Sascha, Markus and Jens clustered, and began to tell them the tale of the abortive telephone interview.

Which, when they’d been all ready and prepared, had turned out not to exist at all.

Part of Kai’s fury undoubtedly came from the knowledge that he’d been set up; not only did he feel that this made him look foolish, but the guilt associated with turning down Dirk’s request for assistance tore at him, too. He jogged across to the four men, and scowled.

“Nobody else around?”

Markus shrugged. “They’re all relaxing, I think, although--”

“Then you’ll have to do,” he snapped. “Come on. I need to find a big car. Henjo, run up to the room and grab that bag of supplies, would you?”

“What supp-- oh, those ones. Sure.”

He vanished at a run, and the three around the table watched him with some surprise. This was a side to Kai that none of them had seen before; they’d seen him happy, angry, sad - Markus remembered that emotion in him all too well - but never crackling with absolute fury like this. He looked ten feet tall, and not one of them was about to refuse him.

In fact, when Sascha got up, he was almost surprised that he had to look down on him.

“What’s up?” he said, pulled his jacket on.

“We have to go and get Dirk and Dani. There’s someone else there too - I think he said Tobi, but I can’t be sure.”

That brought Jens to his feet in a hurry. “Bar fight?” he asked, and Kai’s snort was sharp.

“Something like that,” he snapped, and caught the bag that a panting Henjo threw him. He eyed Markus. “Are you coming?”

The big man stood up and stretched. “Why not,” he said with a smile.

“Good. And now,” he said, and his grin had returned to the impish wickedness that was all Kai, “I need to steal us a car.”

~*~

“Kai! You can’t take that!”

He ignored Jens’ agonised whisper, and narrowed his eyes. She’d said that all you needed to do was let your mind feel its way along the wires and connectors; these electronic locks were easier than the old mechanical ones, because you didn’t have to move anything. You just told it what to think, and it followed your instructions like a well-behaved dog.

The central locking clunked open, and he grinned. She was right, what do you know.

“Get in,” he said, and hopped into the driver’s seat; a brush of his fingers across the ignition and the big Range Rover roared to life, the powerful engine revving under his anxious right foot.

“Oh fuck it,” muttered Jens, and scrambled in to slump next to a grinning Sascha.

“Come on,” he whispered in his ear as Kai swung the big vehicle out of the car park, “it’ll be fun - bet you’ve never been arrested for stealing a car on tour before.”

Jens put his face in his hands, and groaned.

~*~

Finding them wasn’t hard. Kai had managed to lock on to their position, and it was as though he followed a thread of fire through the dark streets; for once luck was going their way, because not a single police car observed Kai’s manic dash through the city.

“For fuck’s sake, Kai!” screeched Henjo when he fishtailed the big car around a corner, and almost lost control.

“We have to hurry!” he snapped in return, and went even faster.

When they reached the alleyway he didn’t hesitate, pointed the car down it and roared the engine when they saw the mass of shadows that tore at four familiar shapes. Several vampires thunked off the bonnet, rolled over the roof; the bounce of the wheels as it went over a couple had Jens’ face going white with shock.

He slewed the vehicle to a halt, and quickly made sure everyone had enough stakes - everyone, that is, except Markus and Henjo. They both reached for the backpacks then hesitated, drew their hands back; Kai’s yell of frustration had Henjo rolling his eyes, and then he tapped the side of his head and he understood.

_The vampires wouldn’t let them help._

He’d forgotten the attacks back in Hamburg, the hold that the vampiric attention left over the two men. He grabbed a bundle of stakes, and snarled through his teeth.

“You two, back to the hotel. We’ll meet you there.”

Pale faced, they staggered out and away, fighting the demands in their brains all the way. That done, Kai shot Sascha and Jens a wicked grin, made sure they were both armed.

“Come on then,” he said, and they dived out of the car and into the fray.

~*~

Sascha’s sheer size gave him an advantage without which they could well have been lost. Once Jens recognised Tobi and Felix he was a dervish that struck his way through the tangle of limbs and claws to get to his friends; his terror lent him a strength he would never have imagined, and he swept the attacking predators aside with barely a glance.

Dirk had propped himself against the wall, half-crouched to favour his injured side; the three ‘shifters were doing their best to protect him, but several scrapes and a lot of scratches indicated that they hadn’t always been successful. With the arrival of the cavalry, however, the cloud of vampires hesitated; the fierce determination of the three men gave them an advantage as they fought for their friends.

Dani bounced from the wall, leaped over Sascha’s shoulder; he spun around, realised that there had been a vampire about to take him down from behind. Rat and vampire formed a screeching ball of violence on the alley floor; the big man waited until he had a clear shot, then struck down - hard - into the middle of it.

The vampire exploded into dust, left the panting rat flat on his back. Sascha extended his hand down, hauled him to his feet.

They clasped forearms for a moment, met each other’s gaze; then Sascha clapped his friend on the shoulder with a grin, and flung himself back into the battle.

A hiss from above, and the remaining vampires pulled back; some ran up the walls, some crawled away, still others just broke and ran. However their mode of movement, in seconds just one remained to snarl at the tired group of humans and ‘shifters.

“Savour your victory,” he snapped, his blonde hair bloodstained nearly black in the dim light of the alley, “because you shall have no more. Your Magus is ours, and we shall return for you. All of you!”

With that, he turned and vanished into the night.

Kai took a moment to eye his weary troops, then cocked his head at the sound of distant sirens.

“Let’s go,” he said, and they were only too happy to comply.

~*~

Yoz was having extreme difficulty keeping her temper in check. But with the knowledge that oblivion lay in the hands of an insane sorceress who couldn’t think in a straight line if her life depended on it she had to; didn’t mean she had to like it, though.

The apartment in the old hospital was windowless, and between exhaustion and the aftereffects of the worm Yoz couldn’t tell if it was night or day outside. Early morning, she assumed; although she couldn’t see any vampires, so the sun might even be up by now. What with one thing and another, even her sense of time had become skewed - and ye Gods, but she was _tired_.

The two women had eaten a light meal, although not much had been said over it. Then the Magus had gone for a shower, and taken full advantage of the ridiculous amount of beauty products she found in the small, neat bathroom. Being captive might suck, but at least she smelt good now.

Her clothes had been tidied away, though, and all she could find to wear was a silk robe; it wasn’t one of Vega’s, because if if it was it would have dragged on the floor. No, this one fit her beautifully, and she couldn’t help a wry smile as the cream silk slid across her shoulders, its cool caress a touch of luxury she hadn’t felt for a very long time.

“Maybe I ought to try being a bad guy,” she observed to her reflection while she brushed out her wet hair, “the perks are pretty fucking good.”

The glimmer of her blue eye mocked the statement, and the brown appeared to agree. She snorted at her whimsy, flicked back her hair, and headed out to see what her personal maniac had planned for her next.

~*~

The lights were dimmed, and incense smoke fragranced the air with jasmine and something with a deeper, darker note; the atmosphere bloomed with seduction, and Yoz padded across the thick rugs with caution. Fuck knows what the mad bitch was up to this time and--

“In here,” called a voice, and the Magus held back a second to roll her eyes.

From the bedroom. Of course it was. Silly Yoz.

The room she entered looked like something from a hedonist’s wildest dream. The bed was an enormous circular pad, the covers a shining pattern of silk and satin quilts and sheets in blues, reds, cream, black; pillows of all sizes scattered across them, although the sorceress herself lounged against a pile of them at one end. Small lanterns hung from various fittings, their warm glow muted but steady across the room, the edges to the walls cloaked in whispering darkness. Rugs layered across the floor and her bare feet made no noise as she walked across toward the ridiculous, magnificent bed, looked for somewhere to sit down that didn’t involve getting too close to Vega.

And yes, Vega herself. Her long form reclined in an elegant sprawl, eyes alight while she watched her adversary pace the room. She wore a filmy nightdress, the smokey grey silk shading the creamy flesh underneath with shadows that did rather more than hint at the delights that could be had, if one chose to indulge. She raised the glass she’d been sipping from, and the glitter of the exquisite cut crystal beckoned Yoz closer.

There was nowhere to sit, so Yoz decided to stand. She stopped beside the bed, folded her arms, and cocked an eyebrow down at the other woman; Vega curled her lips into a small smile, and uncoiled long enough to pour her a glass of the liqueur from the decanter that sat on a low table beside them. She passed the glass to Yoz, and they tilted their glasses at each other, drank; Vega waved the other woman to sit, and sighed when Yoz made no move to do so.

“Please, Yolanda, sit. Be comfortable. The robe fits?”

Whatever was in the glass tasted good, and Yoz monitored the effects of it as it entered her system. Mildly narcotic, a little hypnotic suggestion; nothing serious, no poison or anything unfriendly like that, but it was certainly intended to loosen her up. For what, she had a sneaking suspicion, but decided to just allow the drink to do its work. 

For the moment.

She tagged the effects within her body, then sat down on the bed.

“Fits lovely, thanks. Nice nightie, by the way.”

Vega laughed, the sound soft with pleasure. “Thank you. You appear to be taking your captivity with better grace than I expected.”

Yoz chuckled, set her now empty glass down on the table, and stretched out on the bed. Thanks to the effect of the drink, her exhaustion and the nice long hot shower the bed felt wonderful against her skin; the smooth sheets caressed across her nerve endings when she moved her body along them. “Well, like you said - you win. For the moment. And I’d be stupid to wreck all this luxury just for a principle, wouldn’t I?”

“And I thought you were such a principled creature,” murmured the sorceress, green eyes heavy with lust. She twined one finger through a heavy red tress that fell across one shoulder, the scarlet of her nail a brighter shade against the low fire of her hair.

“When I have to be,” sighed Yoz, and rolled over on to her back. She could feel a tendril of awareness touching her mind, and after a brief argument with herself let it in; after all, what was the point in fighting now?

“You really are a remarkable woman,” purred that voice again, and Yoz chuckled.

“Thanks. You’re not so bad youself, you know.”

“Oh, I am aware of that.”

Heat began to curl low in her belly, and the Magus chuckled as she rubbed her thighs together. So that was her game, was it? Not that she was averse to it, but she had to at least make an attempt to protest--

Yoz sat up and wagged a finger at the sorceress. “Don’t do this, Vega.”

The other woman smiled, a slow stretch of pleasure across her features as she strengthened the lascivious assault on Yoz’ mind and body.

“Why not? Are we not allowed to indulge ourselves occasionally?”

 _Too warm in here. Far too warm._

Yoz rose to her feet, slid the robe from her shoulders; it felt good gliding against her skin, the whisper of the fine silk a caress of delight all the way down her body until it pooled around her feet and she stood naked before the eyes of the sorceress. 

“Occasionally?” she asked with a rogueish grin, and Vega stretched one long, elegant arm out to her.

Yoz took her hand and let herself be drawn forward, the sensation of skin on silk almost hiding the exploring tentacles of the other woman’s mind within her own. Vega could be gentle, that much was obvious; if she hadn’t been an expert herself at sneaking into other peoples conscious minds she would never have felt a thing.

She straddled the other woman’s thighs, cocked her head to one side and raised an eyebrow. “There’s places you can’t go, you know,” she murmured. “Doesn’t matter what you do, all the good stuff is locked down tight.”

The awareness changed direction, and the bolt of heat this time was sharp. Vega’s lips parted when the Magus moaned, rough hands catching on the skin of her arms as she slid them up to cup the beautiful, wicked face between her palms.

“Christ that’s good,” she murmured, even as she leaned forward to kiss her.

They took their time, explored the softness of each other’s mouths; Yoz ran her fingers through Vega’s hair, twined the silken strands around her hands, weighed the heavy fall between her fingers before sitting back and bringing it to her nose. She inhaled the scent, then leaned in to kiss her again.

“You know,” she murmured, “that this is really a very bad idea, don’t you?”

Vega pulled her down again, and in moments the two women had twined together in the nest of silks and satin pillows, hands exploring every inch of soft, pale or inked flesh. Vega placed a gentle kiss against Yoz’ throat, and chuckled.

“Hell with it,” she murmured, and the two women laughed softly together before they let their bodies drift into a concupiscient haze.

~*~

_The post coital cigerette is always the best one,_ Yoz mused as she blew a long stream of smoke toward the darkness of the ceiling, _although the most...clichéd._

The two women were sprawled comfortably in the centre of the huge bed, sweat slowly drying on their bodies. Vega was tracing a tattooed pattern over Yoz’ ribs with one forefinger, and the Magus was trying very hard not to giggle. She didn’t giggle. Ever. She hadn’t giggled since she was twelve.

She settled for gently slapping the hand away instead. Vega crawled closer, laid her head on the Magus’ shoulder.

“What’s this?” she murmured, and cocked an eyebrow. “Affection?”

“Mm,” was the sleepy reply. “Sort of, I guess. I don’t usually get to cuddle afterwards.”

A little disturbed by the confession Yoz nevertheless responded as gallantly as she could; she looped her arm around the tall woman’s shoulders and pulled her closer, dropped a light kiss on the crown of her head. Mind you, if Vega was feeling cuddly, maybe she’d be talkative, too.

“I assume,” she began carefully, keeping the tone light, “that it was no accident Kai and Henjo couldn’t come to meet me?”

Well, that was a giggle - incongruous as that was from the sorceress who could kill small children without so much as breaking a sweat. Horrid sound, but Yoz nuzzled into the thick crown of hair anyway.

“Of course not,” she smiled, and wriggled up to plant a gentle kiss on Yoz’ lips. “Had Henjo been with you he could have touched the building and found out that I was waiting for you. And if my vampiric companions had blocked him, you would have known that the game was up. And Kai is just too powerful to have around; he’s too much of a variable, a wild card. And the sort of power he has in his pocket is just - astounding.”

She sat up, trailed a finger from the Magus’ lips down her chin, throat, between her breasts. “The ink really does go all the way,” she wondered, and they both chuckled over that. “So anyway,” she asked, green eyes bright with frank curiosity, “why don’t you use him more? Draw power from him?”

Yoz shrugged. “Because I do try and stay on the side of right. Usually. And just draining him like that would be... wrong.”

“On the side of the angels?” smirked Vega, and Yoz laughed.

“Have you ever met any angels? Ha! Demons are easier. At least you know they’re out to fuck you over. Anyway,” soothed Yoz, seeing that Vega had flinched at the mention of demons, “I don’t know about you but I’m knackered. I need some sleep.” She stubbed out her cigarette, slid one hand up the smooth expanse of leg next to her, smiled. 

Vega nodded, and they curled together under the sheets, a series of slow, sweet, sleepy kisses taking them into the region between sleep and wakefulness.

“Night Yoz,” murmured the sorceress, “I’m going to miss you tomorrow night.”

The Magus cracked one eye open. 

“Why?”

“Because you’ll be dead, silly,” was the reply, followed almost immediately by the sound of somnolence. Yoz stared at the ceiling, wide eyed, and suddenly didn’t feel sleepy at all.

~*~

With Dirk incapacitated and Yoz missing it fell to Kai to lead the search. Although his bassist swore he’d be well enough to play he certainly wouldn’t be fit enough to go wandering the streets of Madrid afterwards. Felix and Tobi were reluctant, as was Dani; although in a pinch they would assist, admitting that they owed her that much. Despite the fact that she’d been proven at least partially right they didn’t feel enough of an obligation to the Magus to put themselves in any more danger.

Kai did.

“Henjo,” he said, just before they were due to hit the stage, “how well do buildings talk to each other? Do they gossip?”

Henjo blinked. “What?”

“If something unusual happens in one part of a city, do buildings share that information? Do they chatter?”

His friend shrugged, twisted a tuning peg on his guitar. “Not like we do. But information spreads... and the more unusual an event, the faster it does so. So I guess they do, in a way.”

“They’d remember a fight like the one where Yoz was taken?”

Henjo cocked his head. “They might - I’d have to ask.”

Kai gave a satisfied nod, and went back to bouncing on the balls of his feet ready to race out on stage. Henjo, however, still frowned; he’d been careful how much contact he’d been having with buildings, limited it to small places, or those that hadn’t been built long enough to have developed a really overwhelming personality. But Kai was asking him to talk to what amounted to an entire city, and that made him worry.

He knew that this was a historic city, an ancient one. Once the souls of the stones felt him touch them and knew he was looking for someone the chances were good that they would all start to try and show him their version of what happened, of where their Magus was, or events that might be relevant. But as buildings often had a very hazy idea of the human scale of time he could find himself being hit with a thousand year’s worth of experience all at once, from several hundred different viewpoints.

This was bad on several levels.

He could get overwhelmed on a purely sensory level, his very human mind burned out by the sheer amount of information flowing into it all at once. Or he could lose the sense of his body, his sense of self, and never return to his own mind; or he could get lost amongst the mass of souls that made up the older part of the city, or become so confused that he couldn’t make sense of all the shouting, or--

He got a slap on the arm from his tech. “Henjo, go!” he hissed, and with a head full of worry he did so; never mind anything else, the show must go on.

For now.

__

~~tbc~~


	15. Fourteen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> They needed to bring her back, and not just for her own welfare; that of a brother 'shifter may well depend upon it, and they had no intention of letting him down.

_****_

Chapter Fourteen

Dirk had managed half the set, perched on a stool and giving the audience a cheerful wave when Kai explained that he’d fallen down the bus steps. Eggi chipped in for a couple of songs as did Markus, much to the delight of the crowd; Dirk was ferried off back to the hotel as soon as he staggered offstage, but overall his condition was far better than it had any right to be, all things considered.

Unless, of course, his DNA was in the process of being rewritten by that of the wolf. The worry about this caused Dani to bite his nails as he talked it over with Felix, once the show was over.

The Edguy drummer, towel slung round his shoulders, munched a piece of pizza whilst he listened to the other man. He shrugged when Dani paused, glances cast over his shoulder to see where the rest of his band were. 

“So what happened to you, then?” he asked, which question stopped Dani in his tracks. In shapeshifter society it was considered very bad form to just ask out of the blue how they had acquired their Beast; it was rare to be born with it, and most were survivors of attacks. It was something confessed only to one’s closest friend - or lover. Still, he supposed that surviving the vampire attack counted as making them pretty good friends, so he figured there was no point making an issue of it.

Dani blinked, then shrugged. Hell, why not. “I was on holiday with some friends - we’d gone to one of those Black Sea resorts, you know the ones. Popular with the Russians, cheap as hell; we were all about sixteen.” He shook his head, gaze lost in the past. “And we met up with these girls.”

“Ah,” said Felix, eyes narrowed, “always the way.”

“So off we go with these girls,” he continued, shooting a dirty look at the other drummer, “and this one I’m with persuades me to go for a drive with her. She knew this nice little romantic place where we could be alone--” he broke off and shook his head at the memory. “Sixteen, and as horny as a dog - I fell for it, who wouldn’t? So we get there and fine, we screw and it’s all very nice. Then she starts up with some weird shit about wanting to chase me through the woods.” He pulled a face, but had to smile at the other man when he clapped him on the shoulder. “Oh fuck, I know. So I say I’m not going to play and dammit, but she starts to change; you can bet I ran then, fast as I fucking could. Never even stopped to put my pants on.”

“She caught you?” asked Felix with some sympathy. Dani shuddered, but shook his head.

“No. She had her whole clan out there, didn’t she? Turns out that hunting tourists is like their local sport, or something - only one or two a summer, just enough not to be noticed. I outran the fucking lot of them, more or less; you could hear them laughing at me, though, bunch of bastards. I was scared to fucking death and they were just playing - but I tell you what, I ran all the harder for it.”

“You didn’t make it, though.” 

“Nah. I was just about to the complex where we were staying when their alpha caught me, right out in the fucking open. Rolled me over, biggest fucking rat I’ve ever seen, and to this day I’ve never seen a buck as big as he was. Piebald bastard. But he said that he was feeling generous and I’d given them the best run they’d had in years, so he was letting me go.”

“After he bit you,” added Felix. Dani nodded, winced.

“Yeah. Bastard ripped me open from collarbone to pubes - just a flesh wound but Christ, I’ve never been so scared in my life. Anyway, I’m lying there, stark bollock naked, bleeding, and she turns up again, doesn’t she? Only now she wants to look after me.” He took a swig of his beer. “Three days I spent with her. She taught me everything I needed to know, and gave me a couple of contacts back in Hamburg for my first change. I went back to the lads, and they were none the wiser; just as envious as hell that I’d spent three days screwing some bird. I couldn’t tell them what really happened, could I?” and now he looked sad, perhaps a little bitter; then he gave himself a shake, and smiled at the other man. “You?” he asked.

Felix laughed. “I was out in the woods late one night - stoned off my box. My parents were away,” and he grinned at Dani’s wry smile; obviously they both had fond memories of that period of their lives, “so I had some friends round. We were smoking weed, drinking, listening to music... and there was a fight about something. Can’t remember what.”

“A girl?”

The snort was explosive. “More than likely! Anyway, I stormed out and promptly got lost in the woods. And that was when I stumbled over a Queen at her kill.”

Dani’s eyes widened. “And you’re still alive?”

“She said to me later,” grinned the other drummer, “that I smelt so bad - weed and booze - that she flinched when she struck, so she just clipped me. Then when she saw me properly, she said I was such a frightened cub she couldn’t bear to kill me.”

His face fell, and he looked down at the bottle of beer in his hand. “She actually carried me back to the house, dumped me on the doorstep she felt so sorry for me. And you don’t normally get it from claws, but we figured that when she carried me back, all that contact must have done it.” He shrugged, then glanced up. “She came to me when it was obvious I had it, offered to watch me through my first Change. We were good friends.”

“Until?” asked Dani, the small hairs on the back of his neck prickling.

“Until the sorceress came to Fulda. She was killed, skinned alive.”

They were silent for a moment, then Felix sighed and waved his beer bottle at Tobi, who could be heard more than seen across the other side of the green room. “She introduced me to Tobi - the son of a friend of hers. He was born one, by the way. You wonder why nothing seems to bother him? You get born royalty, that’s what happens.”

They watched Tobi goofing off for a moment, then Dani laughed under his breath. “And he gets away with behaving like that?”

“Why do you think he loves being on tour?”

“Good point.”

“Anyway,” Felix continued, giving Dani a clap on the shoulder that almost knocked him sideways, “we’ll help you find your Magus. If that bitch has got her, well, I owe her one. So do my clan. As for Dirk, well...” and he shook his head. “We’ll just have to see, won’t we?”

~*~

Yoz waited until the woman snuggled against her side was fast asleep, then pushed a tentative thought toward her mind. No response; she must feel so secure in her lair that she didn’t need to take precautions. Unless she was being very, very subtle, perhaps?

A few more minutes careful exploration showed her that no, she was indeed that stupid.

Only herself to blame, then.

The Magus dropped her into a deeper sleep, one that verged on coma; you could parade a mariachi band though here now, and she wouldn’t hear a thing. But that would be sheer flash, and all the Magus wanted to do was explore. And maybe escape. If at all possible.

The only thing she could find to wear was the flimsy robe she’d been given earlier, so she knotted the belt around her waist with a long suffering sigh and slipped out of the bedroom. The lounge area was dark, although not completely; that the sorceress felt the need to keep a small night light burning was a fascinating little fact that Yoz tucked away in her mind for possible future use. The minion of the Darkness afraid of the good old ordinary absence of light?

Interesting.

A movement, a breath of air; someone else was in the room, and Yoz froze so still that even the furniture moved more than she did. But when the other individual shifted his position so that he could be seen by the dim glow of the night light, she relaxed and let out a long hiss of frustration.

“Valdrin!” she snarled, and hurried to his side. “What the _hell_ are you doing here? I haven’t seen you since I left England.”

The huge eyes of the Weaver turned down to look at her, and the usually dour expression actually brightened a little.

“The sorceress who serves the killing Dark in such a diligent fashion must be very deeply asleep, Balanced One,” he murmured, keeping his voice low, “for I doubt that one so out of tune with the normal workings of our mother Universe would be sanguine about your late night stroll around her habitation.”

“She’s batshit insane, I agree,” hissed Yoz, “now come on, get me out of here!”

He crooked a finger, and she followed him out of the room - either the door had been unlocked or he’d bypassed it somehow - into the blinding white light of the corridor. The diffuse pupils of his huge wet eyes closed down to tiny pinpricks, and Yoz slapped a hand over hers; the sudden transition from almost darkness to this daylight level hurt like hell, and only the knowledge that getting found would hurt considerably more kept her from swearing out loud. Of the two vampire guards there was no sign; she assumed that Valdrin had decoyed them away, or disposed of them - as long as they weren’t there, however, she was happy.

Valdrin led her down several of the shining corridors, ducking into side rooms or empty cells whenever anyone moved along them; it must still be dark outside, because more than once Yoz smelled vampire, and shuddered when they passed. 

Now it grew dark again, and they dropped down what must once have been a fire escape. Metal steps slick with condensation and mould creaked beneath their feet, and more than once the Weaver had to reach out and steady his companion with a cool, long-fingered hand.

“Balanced one, you appear to be coping at somewhat less than your full capacity. You are much weakened by events, is this not so?”

“It’s been a tough couple of weeks,” she ground out between clenched teeth. “Now can we please get on? I have to get out before Miss Batshit Insane 2006 wakes up. Hurry it up.”

“In this particular instance it will not be possible to attempt to seek egress from this facility.”

She grabbed the handrail, cursed under her breath when it creaked and threatened to give way. “ _What?_ ”

“Other tasks must be performed to ensure the smooth turn of the element of space and time that--”

“Fine, fine. Whatever. God, I hate you bastards.”

Valdrin flicked one pale nictitating membrane across his eye in a sober approximation of a wink; she followed him down the stairs, and muttered between gritted teeth the whole way.

~*~

This must be the part of the hospital where the special cases were kept, Yoz thought as she and the Weaver made their way along a dark concrete tunnel, a long way under the main body of the hospital. The cells were spaced more widely here, and some of the equipment left to rot in the treatment rooms bore silent witness to a brutal regime of handling that had nothing to do with a cure, and everything to do with control - by whatever means necessary.

It even made the Magus shudder, and she found herself hoping once more that the hapless Henjo never found the place.

Valdrin paused outside a particular door, touched the lock lightly with his fingers; the sound it made when it obeyed his command to open had Yoz dancing on the balls of her feet with agitation, and she glared around wildly to see if anyone had heard. The Weaver just smiled, and beckoned her in.

The construct that revealed itself to them made Yoz frown. It wasn’t immediately obvious to her what it was; a white circle on the damp concrete of the cell floor, echoed by another on the ceiling above it. Ringing both were lights, glass covered circles that looked for all the world like domestic spotlights, but conversely they seemed to emit nothing visible. A control panel to one side that was little more than a bank of switches, and that was all.

The only other thing of note was the individual curled into a ball in the centre of the circle on the floor, huddled into itself as far as it could go. Whatever sort of radiation the blank lamps emitted must be either painful or deadly to the prisoner, because he was hunched as far from them as it was possible to get.

Yoz glanced at the Weaver, pointed at the miserable bundle; it was quicker to communicate without words, in this instance. If she asked him what the Hell was going on it could take him a week to answer. So she pointed, cocked her eyebrows; _is this what you wanted me to see?_

He nodded, and she padded closer to the peculiar cell. Her bare feet tapped on the wet floor, and the person inside began to uncurl; he could hear her approach, and peered out under one arm to see who might be coming to torture him now.

It wasn’t easy to tell which of them was more surprised, but for a moment vampire and Magus stared at each other in shock.

“Nice outfit,” said James eventually.

~*~

“Ah, I don’t know,” said Tobi, and twisted his head to avoid Kai’s glare, “you keep telling us how powerful she is - won’t we just mess it up for her if we go stomping around the city looking?”

Felix and Dani exchanged glances. Kai had gone into a frenzy of trying to persuade them all to help him search for the missing Magus almost as soon as the show was over, and so far wasn’t having much luck. This was making him angry, and those that had never gone up against an angry Kai were having some trouble dealing with it.

He got in Tobi’s face, nose to nose, and glared. 

Weiki snickered, and earnt himself a shot in the ribs from Andi for his trouble.

He’d managed to gather most of the three bands in the hotel bar; Dirk was still in his room, sound asleep, and Dan kept him company. Eero sat close to Henjo, as uncertain about Kai’s tantrum as the rest.

“You and Felix can talk to the city’s predators,” insisted Kai, through his teeth, “Dani can talk to the rats--”

“What?” said Dani, and sat up with a blink. Sascha grinned at him.

“--while Henjo and I go ask the buildings. That is what will happen. Right?”

Tobi gave in with a rush of breath, figuring that anything was better than having to face off with an angry Kai. “Fine. Fine. When?”

“Now,” he growled, and turned away to discuss with Henjo where they should start. Tobi opened his mouth to protest, then shut it with a snap when he saw Kai’s shoulders bunch at the anticipated complaint.

Dani shook his head, and ambled across to join Felix; he patted Tobi on the shoulder as he went past, and earned himself an evil glare.

“I think we should go and see Dirk, before we go,” he suggested quietly. The other drummer nodded thoughtfully, then glanced across at Tobi. The smaller man had stalked across to join the other Edguys, flung himself down next to Jens and appeared to be complaining bitterly - but in an undertone, just in case Kai heard him.

“Good idea.”

~*~

He woke from a light doze to hear voices, a discussion pitched a little too low for him to hear clearly. He blinked sand from his eyes, shifted; Dan, who seemed to have dozed off, awoke with a jerk at his soft mutter of pain.

“Dirk. You ok, you want something?”

“I - no. I just thought I heard--”

The knock was soft, little more than a scratch at the doorframe. Dan cocked an eyebrow at his friend, touched him on the shoulder and went to answer the door. Dirk was more than a little startled to see his friend stop to pick up a wicked looking stake before he did so; he wouldn’t like to be the vampire that tried to get past Dan, the way he was holding it. He looked like a man that staked ten vampires before breakfast, just to work up an appetite.

Mind you, he doubted that a vampire would bother to knock, but it was the principle of the thing.

Dani’s voice from the corridor was amused, and Dan waved the visitors through before he checked the corridor, shut the door quietly.

“I’ll turn the lights up,” he offered, but Felix touched his arm, shook his head no. 

“It’s fine.”

Dirk wriggled a little further upright, the stab of pain from side and hip bringing a gasp to his lips. Dan was there in a heartbeat; worried green eyes probed his gaze to see how bad it was, strong hands so gentle as they propped him up.

“My room,” he chuckled, once the pain had loosened enough for him to get his breath back, “is full of drummers.”

“Are you gonna be alright for a bit?” asked Dan, and Dirk waved his fingers at him.

“Go. I’m fine.”

Once the room was quiet again, the two men perched on either side of the bed regarded Dirk gravely.

“How are you feeling?” asked Dani, and Dirk shrugged.

“Sore. But I figured it would be worse - when she bit me I thought I was going to die. Felt like she’d torn my side out. Can’t have been that bad though, because it’s almost healed.”

His smile faded when he saw the two men share a glance across the bed. Their expressions did not bode well for whatever either one of them wanted to say.

“Look,” said Dani quietly, “it really was that bad. I thought she’d killed you.”

“But--”

He took his hand, gripped it between his palms and stared into Dirk’s anxious expression. “Do you know how it spreads? The shapeshifting?”

“I - no, not really.”

Felix took his other hand, and both the ‘shifters could feel the tremble along the muscles and bones. “Some are born like it, like Tobi. But whatever it is - I suppose it’s a bit like a virus - it’s usually transferred by a bite.”

Dirk swallowed hard, and the others saw the realisation dawn in his eyes. “But there must be something you can do,” he whispered. Dani and Felix exchanged glances.

“We can be there for you when you have your first change,” Dani said, slowly. “No ‘shifter will let another go through that alone, if they can help it. Doesn’t matter what pack or clan you belong to.”

Dirk yanked his hands back, scrambled up with a gasp of pain to curl against the headboard. Eyes wide, he fumbled for his cigarettes; Dani passed them across, steadied his hand as he scrabbled to get one out and light it.

“But it’s not certain, right?” he asked, a glimmer of hope in his expression.

“No,” agreed Felix, although his eyes gave the frightened man all the truth he needed, “it’s not certain. But you heard us coming down the corridor, and you were asleep; Dan never heard a thing. Your sense of hearing is sharper, your eyesight and smell won’t be far behind. You’re healing at an accelerated rate, and--”

Dirk shook his head, almost frantic now. “I want to talk to Yoz. Find Yoz for me, please - she’ll be able to do something, I know she will. She’ll be able to take it away.”

Felix opened his mouth to argue, but Dani gave a tiny, nearly imperceptible shake of his head and he let it go with a sigh. Very few ever took the news well, and Dirk had some pretty hard thinking ahead of him; some never learned to cope, and the suicide rate amongst new ‘shifters was huge. They would just have to keep an eye on him.

The two men left the room, and set out to collect Tobi and begin the hunt for the Magus. They needed to bring her back, and not just for her own welfare; that of a brother ‘shifter may well depend upon it, and they had no intention of letting him down.

~*~

“What the fuck are you doing here?” James and Yoz asked each other at the same time. He shook his head, eyed the Magus where she stood before him in nothing but the flimsy silk robe, hand pushed through her wild mop of blue-streaked black hair.

“You first,” he grinned, “because I _really_ want to know how you ended up in the basement of Vega’s insane asylum stinking of sex and wearing nothing but half a metre of silk.”

“Oh fuck you,” she snorted, but despite the seriousness of the situation his glee was so impish she couldn’t help a grin in return. “It’s a long story - short version, she laid a trap, I walked into it, and she’s going to kill me in the morning. Which can’t be far off now, right?”

“Right,” he agreed, still with the grin firmly affixed to his face. He cocked his head on one side, and winked. “What do you know, the ink really does go all the way.”

“James! Dammit. What happened to you, anyway?”

He became serious, shuffled himself into a cross legged pose. “I was travelling to meet you in Hamburg to remove the worm when her people grabbed me. Yoz, she’s managed to subvert about half the vampire Council - she’s got her people deep inside our organisation. They never intended to let me remove it from you.”

“I know,” agreed the Magus, “she’s got the codes. So you can take it out of me now, right?”

He gestured at his peculiar cage. “Only if you let me out.”

“Fine,” she said, after barely a moment’s hesitation. There was an argument going on in her head; he was a vampire, and thus every instinct she had demanded that, at best, she leave him to rot down here and at worst she leave behind nothing but a small heap of dust. However, pragmatism won out; if she let him out and he removed the worm, then she could escape and Vega could get stuffed, quite frankly.

Her fingers hesitated on the control panel. As a precaution, she sent a sliver of awareness down the wires and across the circuits, checking them for - and there it was. The controls were booby trapped, and if she turned the contraption off the whole room would explode. Which would be bad, she thought as she ground out a curse between her teeth.

“James, it’s rigged to explode. I’ll have to try something else; do you know how the fucking thing works?”

He got to his feet, turned a palm up. “It’s ultra-violet light. I can’t cross it - it would fry me to ashes. It’s strong enough that it would even burn your skin, Magus.”

She nodded, then narrowed her eyes as a thought occurred to her. Flattening her palms before her, she began to weave a construct in the air before her, slid it forward until it was between two of the invisible bars of the vampire’s cage. Valdrin reappeared beside her, and eyed the ceiling, James rubbed his hands together, bared his fangs. 

“Hurry, Magus. It’s almost dawn.”

“I know. Shut the fuck up.”

She enlarged the construct until she had two sheets of energy balanced on nothing more than sheer skill between the invisible bars of the cage. Then she squinted at them, murmured under her breath and moved her palms apart; soon she had her hands cupped and the energy had followed the shape of her hands to balloon into an ellipse of impossibility. They bent reality just enough to push the bars apart without breaking the beams; once she had a workable gap she glanced quickly at the vampire, hissed between her teeth.

“Can you get out that gap?”

He angled his shoulders, twisted his body and frowned. “A little more...?”

“Knickers,” she growled, and adjusted the position of her hands a fraction. She was breathing hard, holding the beams and the bars and the entire fragile construction with no more than sheer bloody-mindedness and skill, and the strain was telling.

James slid out through the opening and laughed. “Done!”

She went to smooth her palms back together, then stopped with a grin. “Bung your jacket back in there,” she demanded.

“Why?”

“Just do it.”

He did, and she let the energy dissipate with a sigh of relief, rotated the tension out of her shoulders. Cool hands touched her neck, and she let the vampire rub the worst of the knots from her muscles. Ordinarily she wouldn’t have let any vampire within ten miles of her neck, but this one was just about to earn himself special dispensation. And they were very talented hands, as it turned out....

She grasped them when he leaned forward to nuzzle at the base of her skull, whirled to face him with her own teeth bared.

“The fuck are you up to?”

The smirk was almost enough to persuade her to change her mind about releasing him. “I might be dead, Magus, but I am not immune to the allure,” and he eyed her up and down, her body outlined clearly where the sweat of effort had caused the sheer silk to cling to her curves, “of the female form. My apologies,” he finished, took her hand and bowed over it to bestow a kiss to her knuckles.

A quiet hiss from the shadows, and she shook herself.

“Enough fucking about, James. Just let me do this--”

She turned back to the cage, and concentrated. Inside there appeared a facsimile of the vampire; the faux-James sat cross legged, apparently deep in thought. He breathed deep and slow, and there was a steady flicker of movement beneath his eyelids. She completed the spell, released the energy she’d gathered in a steady whisper.

“Right. That’ll sit there for a day or two - long enough. Time to get rid of this fucking thing in my head. Now.”

James nodded. “Brace yourself, Magus,” he murmured, “because this is going to hurt.”

~*~

She came round cradled in Valdrin’s arms, the steady rock of his gait somehow soothing. She let her aching head fall back against his shoulder, and tried not to groan. He made a small noise in his throat, a pacifying rumble; she sighed, curled tighter in his grasp, and let herself be carried.

James, trotting along beside them, snorted with amusement.

“Still with us, Magus?” he asked, smirk back in full force on his face.

“Fuck off,” she grumbled. “We gettin’ out?”

“No,” said the vampire, “Valdrin says that there are things that have to occur and we can’t leave until they happen. Only he took longer to say it. So I thought I’d just give you edited highlights.”

A grunt was his only reply, and he went back to amusing himself by watching the way her robe flapped up with the passage of air from the Weaver’s swift passage through the old building. He wondered what she would have said when they first met had he suggested a scenario such as this, and almost laughed aloud; despite the pain he knew that she must be feeling better, because a patterned hand appeared over the Weaver’s shoulder - and shot him the finger.

He couldn’t contain the chuckle this time.

~*~

The trio pulled up outside Vega’s room, and the Weaver set her carefully on her feet. The worst of the pain had subsided, but she knew it would take a day or two for it to vanish completely. And somewhat longer than that for the organic remnants of the worm’s body to be flushed out of her system, but at least it was dead. No more bomb in her head, and she managed to shoot the Weaver a weak smile.

“You going now?” she asked and he bowed to her. James, on the other hand, stumbled, and Valdrin caught his arm with one hand.

“Dawn,” he gurgled, and went limp.

The Weaver hoisted him over his shoulder, and shot one of his enormously peculiar winks down at the Magus, leaned against the doorframe with her eyes half closed.

“Rest assured that the Universe is turning as she ought, and your part in the current weave of events is as vital as anything you have ever been an integral part of. Continue to be true to the balance of your unique nature, and all shall play out as it should.”

“Just carry on, right?”

Another wink, and the Weaver was gone. Yoz hoped the vampire woke up with a back knotted to origami, and sneaked back into Vega’s room.

The sorceress still snored away in the bedroom, and Yoz took a moment to freshen up before she came back to bed. A light touch on her mind and she returned to normal sleep; she murmured something under her breath, nuzzled into Yoz’ neck.

Another sweet, sleepy kiss, and both women dropped into a deep, dreamless sleep.

~*~

This time Kai had legitimately obtained use of the vehicle that he was driving - far more sedately than he’d piloted the stolen Range Rover - into the old town in search of a good place for Henjo to begin his own search.

Henjo chewed at his fingernails, and worried. He couldn’t seem to get it across to Kai just how dangerous this little exercise could be; he’d tried, more than once, only to be gaily reassured that if it got to be too much he could just disengage and that would be that. Simple, no?

Parked up they strolled the narrow streets, dawn just beginning to stain the sky with its imminent arrival; it was going to be another beautiful day, and despite exhaustion Kai felt positive. Henjo would do his thing and they could go and fetch the Magus, she could kill Vega and that would be that; they could do the last few dates in peace, and it would be over.

Perfect.

He ran his fingers across the harsh grain of a rough cut stone in the side of a building.

“Here, Henjo?” he asked, and his companion eyed the wall.

The buildings knew he was here; he’d been picking up a faint susurrus of excitement just outside his mental range, faint enough that he couldn’t identify individual buildings within it but clear enough to know that news of his arrival had spread with what - for stone - was lightning speed.

“As good a place as any,” he agreed with a long suffering sigh, squared his shoulders, and laid both hands on the wall before him.

Kai waited.

Henjo’s eyes widened, briefly, and then drifted shut; well, he’d obviously made contact so now all he had to do was be patient and he’d have his answer.

He didn’t do patient very well.

So he paced up and down the street, kept one ear on Henjo, watched the sunrise. Still nothing from his companion, and he ambled back across the cobbles to join him once more. That was when he realised that something was wrong; Henjo’s breathing had become shallow and fast, his chest moving in quick jerks where he tried to keep the flow of air going in and out of his body. He was pale - white as a sheet - and lines of tremendous strain grooved his forehead.

Worse still, he had a nosebleed. Kai rummaged in his pockets, cursed; a tiny worm of guilt twisted at the back of his head at the memory of Henjo trying to tell him that this might be too much, but he stomped on it and dabbed the blood away from his friend’s face. His eyes blinked open for a second, and now Kai did swear; the whites were red, scarlet with burst blood vessels from side to side, the soft brown lost in the terror that held him in its taloned grip.

He opened his mouth and released a long, low sound like rocks tearing loose from the earth, and collapsed.

~*~

The sound of the shower woke Yoz, and she blinked open sand-filled eyes to the soft light of the opulent bedroom. She still had a dreadful headache, but that was to be expected; she turned her face into the pillow, bared her teeth for the fierce delight of being alone in her head once more.

Pad of bare feet outside the bedroom, and she heard the sorceress issuing commands in her most imperious tones; Yoz cocked an ear, and grinned when she discovered that the other woman even ordered breakfast as though it were a life and death mission. And a good range, too; whatever she might wish, it would be waiting once she got up and had a shower.

She felt a lump by her leg, rummaged under the quilt and pulled out the last thing she would have expected to find. A teddy bear, somewhat battle scarred and threadbare but nevertheless, a bear. With eyes sunk deep in his golden brown head and ears much ragged, not to mention paws that--

It opened its eyes and looked at her.

“Mother _fucker!_ ” she yelped, and tossed the toy across the room in shock.

It landed against a carved chest, upside down; the beady black eyes glared at her until it toppled over to lay flat on the floor, face down. She wrapped her arms around her knees, stared at it with wide eyes; she hadn’t felt so much as a whisper until the damn thing had opened its eyes, and then she’d been struck by a black wave of sheer loathing, strong enough to shock even her.

Vega strolled back into the room, elegant and beautiful even without makeup; she looked younger, almost vulnerable with her red hair hanging slick over her shoulders from her shower, another of the silken robes hanging to mid thigh and belted tight around her slender waist.

She spotted the bear, picked it up; she tapped one long finger against the ragged stitching of its nose and smiled.

“Have you been scaring Yolanda? Bad bear,” she chuckled, and Yoz felt that struggling sense of hatred roll from the stuffed toy in waves. The sorceress turned back toward the bed, tossed it to her; she caught it by sheer reflex, turned the evil little thing around in her hands until she could meet that black, fathomless gaze once more.

“What the fuck--” she began. Vega perched on the edge of the bed and smiled, reached out to trail one scarlet nail along the Magus’ arm.

“His name is Julian. Don’t tell me you can’t tell what he is, Yoz?”

 _Fine, put it like that and you’ve issued a challenge_ , she thought grimly. She concentrated, let her Other sight explore the stuffed toy; sure enough, amongst the nylon fluff that filled him lurked bags of spell ingredients, written pieces of parchment - all powerful stuff - but the most important component was hidden right in the centre of the fuzzy torso.

A human heart, dried out, spelled with dark enchantment to hold the soul of the man in whose chest it had once beat. She very carefully laid the animal down on Vega’s pillow, and cocked an eyebrow at the other woman.

“So who was he?” she asked, getting out of bed; she felt an uncomfortable urge to hide her body from the wicked gaze of the stuffed toy.

“My father,” was the airy reply, accompanied by a shrug. She drew Yoz forward until she stood between her thighs, and ran her hands along the patterned flanks. “He always told me that a great ugly thing like me would never amount to anything - that I would come to a bad end.” She leaned in and kissed the skin between Yoz’ breasts, either not noticing or choosing to ignore the shudder that shot through the other woman at the action.

“He would come to me at night, and tell me I should pray to God to forgive me for tempting him so,” she continued, and now emotion coloured her voice.

Hatred.

“God,” murmured Yoz, and tried to throttle the sense of pity that welled up inside her. She could see the scene as clear as day, Vega was broadcasting so strongly; the gawky woman-child, wracked by the fires of puberty, hidden under the quilt and begging any that might listen to spare her tonight. The door cracked open, and a slice of light knifed across her shuddering form; he was drunk again, which meant that he would be brutal. Or more brutal than usual, and at breakfast everyone would ignore the bruising and it would hurt to sit and why was this happening? Why did her mother say nothing? Why could he come to her night after night and curse her and hard hands pinch and slap and delve and God it hurt so much--

Yoz shook herself. Vega was one hell of a projecting empath when she got angry, and the emotion in those glorious eyes when she picked the bear up and turned it in her fingers was nothing short of sheer fury.

“So I ran away and I learned. I learned and learned and when I knew enough I went home and I cut out his heart - dear Julian, you get to watch me now, don’t you? But that filthy tongue is silent, and I think that’s what hurts him the most. But when the great Darkness comes he’ll be the last thing to dissolve into it - and I shall be there to watch.”

Yoz felt the bear shoot her a silent glance, a plea for help; she shuddered and turned away, the whole thing just too sick and sad to contemplate. Abuse begets abuse, and horrific as the other woman’s experience had been it didn’t excuse wholesale slaughter, genocide, the elimination of the gleam of life for an entire universe.

Nevertheless, Yoz pitied her.

“Ready for breakfast?” asked the sorceress brightly, and Yoz let herself be taken by the hand and drawn into the brightly lit sitting room. She cast a last glance over her shoulder at the bear, and heard the wail of frustration in her mind when she turned away.

Funnily enough, she’d lost her appetite.

_~~tbc~~_


	16. Fifteen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He tried to calm them, to ask them about specifics and they became afraid; would he take himself from them before they had chance to speak? Would he run and let them go into the darkness of ruin and demolition unremembered?

_****_

Chapter Fifteen

It had been waiting for him.

It had heard of him, the miraculous human that could see into their world, share their perceptions, tell their stories; all things fear the darkness of oblivion, and with his arrival came their chance to not go to dust and ruin unremembered. But they didn’t understand the limitations of the human mind - if he could hear them, they reasoned in the great, slow flicker of life through the stones, then that was all that mattered. He mattered to them. They needed to tell him their stories.

But they would be gentle. They would pour their history and their love into him with care, so that he could feel their joy at being able to share themselves with him; they would teach him how the stone and the dust and the brick had come together to tell the fables and the myths of the city, break from their long silence to tell him how they were bound to the species that had made them.

So when they felt his gentle touch they began in the fashion which they had agreed to.

It didn’t last.

He tried to calm them, to ask them about specifics and they became afraid; would he take himself from them before they had chance to speak? Would he run and let them go into the darkness of ruin and demolition all forgotten?

The older voices amongst them were lost in the panic, and they all shouted at once.

~*~

Henjo wouldn’t wake up. Kai had managed to drag his semi-conscious form to the car, still mumbling fragments of words and sounds, and drove back to the hotel through the early morning light in a lot less sedate a fashion than the one in which he’d left it. 

Dan met him in the lobby, green eyes heavy with sleep; Kai’s frantic call had woken him, and his expression promised trouble over that - right up until he saw Henjo. 

He didn’t even hesitate, but swept the semi-conscious man up into his arms and cradled him against his chest, his steps swift to the elevators. He ignored Kai for the moment, and studied the face of his friend; white with shock, bloodshot eyes rolled back in his head and a stream of half-muttered syllables falling from lips bitten through and bleeding. Dan cocked his head to listen, then turned to eye Kai severely.

“What did you do?” he asked, and his tone was - at best - disapproving.

Kai shuffled his feet and tried to avoid meeting his own eye in the mirrors that lined the walls of the lift.

“Nothing, honest. He put his hands on the wall and... wallop.”

“’Wallop’?”

“He just fell over. What?”

“He’s speaking in about four different languages. You know how hard he’s been finding this lately - and you got him to speak to the whole city, didn’t you?”

“Well....”

“Kai.”

“Fine! Yes! I asked him to see if any of the buildings remembered the attack and to do that he had to try and speak to all of them. Anyway, what do you mean, four languages?”

“Christ, Kai,” Dan muttered, glared at the smaller man. He scowled back, and Dan sighed. “I can hear Spanish - obviously - French, Arabic, and at least one other. I have no idea what that is.”

“Arabic? Henjo doesn’t speak Arabic - anyway, how do _you_ know?”

The big man snorted, strode out of the lift toward Henjo’s room as soon as the soft ping of the bell indicated their arrival, the doors folding back with a mutter of mechanical protest. “Dated a Lebanese girl once - I can’t speak much of it, but I can recognise it when I hear it.”

Kai was practically having to jog to keep up with Dan’s long strides. “Why is he speaking different languages? We’re in Spain, aren’t we? And anyway, what would that have to do with--”

“Key,” interrupted Dan, and Kai rummaged through Henjo’s pockets until he found it, then led the way into the room.

“What would that have to do,” he continued doggedly, determined to prove that this wasn’t all his fault, “with talking to the buildings?”

Dan laid Henjo on the bed, turned down the harsh lighting until he seemed comfortable, then wandered across to the window and folded his arms. The stare he shot at Kai was hard, and more than a little unforgiving.

“Kai, how much history do you actually _know?_ ”

He stared at the ceiling, at the bed, at Henjo’s feet - anywhere but at either Dan or Henjo’s faces. One made him feel horribly guilty, and the other like a schoolboy caught doing something naughty in the girl’s toilets. Neither were feelings he particularly enjoyed.

“Not a lot,” he admitted.

“So it never occurred to you that a city that’s been inhabited since the stone age, that’s had wave after wave of conquerors, seen blood, death, more wars than you can count - not to mention plagues and famines - might have quite a lot to say?”

He stared. He hadn’t thought of it like that.

Dan wrung his hand across his eyes. “Well, you’d better go and get some sleep - I’ll stay with him, if you like. Dirk says he’s fine and doesn’t want nursemaiding, so that leaves Eero and I free. Why don’t you crash out for a couple of hours; I’ll come and get you if he wakes up.”

Kai looked across at his friend on the bed, pale faced and muttering. Dan was right; there wasn’t much point him staying here and wearing himself out further.

“Fine. But when Dani and the others get back, come and wake me, OK?”

“I will. Now go.”

Cursing himself over and again in his head he went, guilt gnawing at his insides. He just hoped that the ‘shifters had found something, or he would be letting Yoz down as well - and that he didn’t think he could bear, not on top of everything else.

~*~

Confusion roared through his head, pictures and sounds and smells and emotion and sensation and--

 _Be calm_ , said a voice. _It will all find its own level_.

But I can’t bear it! he wailed to the kindly sound, the cacophony pulling at his awareness to reclaim him for its own. He was drowning, lost in French invasion, civil war, Moorish captivity, everything that had happened that the stones of the place remembered. Each tried to tell its story, pass along what it remembered; he was besieged by sunrise, scorched by the sun of a million noons and lost in a thousand thousand velvet nights.

Louder, slower voices crooned in the background, and one by one the other voices fell silent. Most of them were unhappy, and he could understand that; he was their only translator, the one human in the teeming millions that bothered to listen to them. The only other humans that tried had all the sensitivity of pond scum, and thus no matter how loud the souls of stone sang to them they remained deaf; understandable, then, that they were as addicted to him as he was becoming to them.

_You understand. That is to be grateful for._

But this experience had frightened him, and he still wasn’t sure if he was all there; what if the new knowledge had shoved something important out, like how to play guitar?

_No, that won’t happen. You are all here, rest assured._

He let his heart slow down, his body relax. Everything ached, and he could only speculate as to how that had happened. Never mind; he could figure that out later, once he’d woken up from this place. Wherever he was.

Another faint streak of worry began to ghost across his mind. This was a good point; where, exactly, _was_ he right now?

 _You are safe in the core of your own psyche_ , soothed the voice, _we hid you there until we could get the youngest ones under control._

Who are you? asked Henjo, and the voice chuckled.

 _We are the Oldest Ones_ , said the voice, and he realised that what he had been hearing wasn’t one voice but several, so close in timbre and tone as to be almost indistinguishable from each other. _We are the soul of the city._

~*~

Yoz picked at her breakfast, and looked at the sorceress. She was calm, reading a newspaper as she drank her coffee and prepared for a hard day’s murder.

The scene was distressingly domestic.

“So tell me,” she said, and Vega lowered a corner of the newspaper to pay attention. “What’s this all about - I mean, really. It’s not as simple as just exterminating the terminally furry, that much I do know.”

Vega smiled. “Why should I tell you? It doesn’t matter.”

“Yeah, but I’m curious. And don’t you think I ought to know? I’ve been good - and didn’t last night earn me some brownie points?” _and I’m betting that you can’t pass an opportunity to gloat, either._

Yoz opened her eyes wide and looked as innocent as she possibly could, which would have alerted anyone that knew her that she was up to something. Vega, however, took it at face value, and folded the newspaper before she poured herself more coffee and smiled across the table at her prisoner.

“You’re right. And what can it hurt? The demon will be here for you shortly.”

The thump of her heart to her toes was so loud Yoz was surprised it didn’t shake the floor. Nevertheless, she overcame the shock that the - not entirely unexpected - news had given her, and sipped her tea. “So they are involved, then.”

“Of course. They want you very badly, Yolanda; when you removed the one from what’s-his-name they were even more determined to have you. They hoped that the war between Rosicrucian and Illuminati would give them their chance, but alas, it did not; but after it was over they made contact with me.” She smiled, and her eyes hazed over with pleasure as she remembered. “Oh, yes. And they knew how valuable I was,” _and modest_ , thought Yoz gloomily, “so between us we hatched a plan that would serve both our purposes.”

“Both?” _Come on, come on, faster!_

“Indeed. They got you, and in the chaos caused by the elimination of the Beasts I could begin the process of returning the glorious Dark. And the vampires were very helpful; they were on the brink of civil war anyway, so finding a faction to work with was simplicity itself.”

“So you were able to kill some vampires - of the right faction, of course,” said Yoz, turning the idea over in her mind, “because you were working with another. Presumably the old ones - the ones that don’t like to change, am I right?”

Vega smiled and nodded, so Yoz continued. “I had the worm in my head, put there by the faction that had no idea you were involved. Which also meant that if I went up against any of the other type I wouldn’t be able to get anything out of them. Clever. So all the slaughter, all the killing - to draw me into the open?”

“Not entirely,” said the sorceress, folding her hands before her. She was as calm as if they’d been discussing the weather. “There was the chaos, of course.”

“Of course,” agreed Yoz with a smile. “But the bit I don’t get is the change of reality. Why those three bands, why that tour?”

“Because you have bound yourself to the one, have you not? However much you would like to protest that you have not; that much became clear during the war. You took some very large risks just to keep those five men safe.”

“ _Almost_ safe.”

“Quite. You weren’t aware of the Beasts within the other two groups, and I was - so arranging for those three to band together and travel would keep your mind so occupied with trying to keep them all from harm that you would never notice what else was happening.”

“And while I was busy looking at murders and trying to keep fifteen men out of your reach you could corner me and pick me off whenever you wished,” mused Yoz, then angled her head at the other woman. “A bit Baroque, as plans go. But pretty effective.”

“You would never allow them to be in any significant danger, so your movements were clear to us. Affection is your weak point, Magus.”

She laughed. “You’re telling me! One last thing, though.”

Vega paused in unfolding her newspaper, raised one perfectly arched eyebrow.

“How did you break the enchantment I placed on you in Antarctica? You’re good,” _liar, liar, pants on fire,_ “but you shouldn’t have been able to break it. Not alone, anyway.”

“I didn’t,” she replied, and went back to her newspaper, “the Lord of Hell did. He had to lift it because nobody else could; he said that you might be an annoying distraction, but you certainly knew how to weave a spell. Now eat up, we’ll be leaving soon.”

~*~

“The city has a soul?” asked Henjo, and Dan jerked awake. His friend still lay on the bed, and although he was still asleep he looked an awful lot better than he had earlier. With any luck he would wake up soon, and with a smile Dan went to get himself more coffee.

Deep inside his own mind, Henjo wondered at the revelation.

_Indeed. We are that which has always been there, and will remain when humanity is but a memory so faint that even the sky forgets. The stones give us voice, but we are as old as time._

Gosh, said Henjo. Does that mean you know where Yoz is, then?

There was startled silence for a moment, and then the cool, rich voice rolled with delighted laughter. _Ah, humanity! Ever looking at its feet when it could be flying to the stars. It is part of your charm, although it may well be the end of you all. In short, little man, yes we know where your Magus is._

Oh good. Where is she, then?

_Toward the edge of the city there is a place where once the mad were kept. It is no longer in use for the original purpose, but the Dark sorceress has it for her own lair these days. The very ground beneath it weeps for the evil that lurks there, and if you could burn it out when you retrieve your little Magus we would be very grateful._

So we can just walk in and get her?

 _Not exactly,_ said the voice. _None but those whose blood is cold can pass the magic that guards the shell of the madness._

That doesn’t make sense. Is it a riddle?

_You will, we are sure, figure it out. In the meantime, little man, be warned; too much contact with the souls of stone will wear you away until there is nothing of you left. One day you will be able to join with them without fear, but not now. If you continue like this then they will look through your eyes, and of your own soul there will be no trace._

The warning was stark, and the tone of the voice left no doubt as to its seriousness. Henjo swallowed hard, and considered the words; did this mean that he couldn’t speak to a building, any building, any more? He opened his mouth to speak again, but the voice hushed him.

_You must awake now. Do not seek us out again; the temptation to ride in your mind and feel the sun and the wind as a living creature is enormous, and not even we can resist it forever. Be well, little man, and remember the stories that the souls sang to you. Do not let them go into the dark unremembered...._

Henjo blinked his eyes open, propped himself up on his elbows; Dan was busy at the desk, mixing extra sugar into his coffee. He looked terrible, careworn and tired, and before he’d even thought about what he was doing Henjo had swung his legs over the edge of the bed and called to him.

“Dan? Are you OK?”

He jumped so hard that the coffee, creamer and sugar went flying, then spun to stare at Henjo as though he’d seen a ghost. The next thing Henjo knew he was swept up into strong arms and hugged to within an inch of his life, all the while having a litany of ‘thank God, you’re alright!’ chanted in his ear.

He swatted at Dan’s arms, and got him to put him down. “What on earth--”

He got no further. “Come on. Dani and the cats are back - I’ve sent them through to see Kai. Can you walk? We’ve been so worried--”

Henjo let himself be washed along on a wave of words, swept through into Kai’s room where his friend looked even worse than Dan had. He was buried in hugs again, and began to get the distinct feeling that something big had happened while he was asleep.

Come to think of it, how had he got back here? And what time was it? And--

“Come on,” said Kai with a grin, and began to shepherd everybody out into the corridor, “we need to put a plan together.”

Henjo gave in, and decided that if he just allowed himself to be shuffled around then in time everything would make sense. Eventually. He hoped.

~*~

Kai backed all fifteen men into a corner of the restaurant and paced. Andi leaned against Markus, almost asleep again; he had not been pleased to be awoken before noon, and the disgruntled expression on Markus’ face showed who had borne the brunt of his ill temper.

He still let Andi use him as a pillow, though. Even if Tobi and his Dirk were flicking balled up pieces of paper at him, trying to get the blonde on the nose to wake him up and have him yell at Markus. Again.

Sascha grinned at their antics, Felix and Dani ignored them all - keeping station on either side of Dirk as they were - and Jens sat back to observe, a smirk on his face. Weikath leaned against the wall behind them all, and watched with calm ice blue eyes the strange mix of silliness and serious purpose that had marked the entire tour thus far.

Henjo, leaning on Dan, spoke up first.

“She’s being held in an insane asylum on the edge of town.”

“Fitting,” murmured Andi against Markus’ shoulder.

“We know,” agreed Dani. “The sorceress has been holed up there for months, apparently; everyone avoids the place like the plague.”

“Not a bad idea,” agreed Tobi lightly, and Kai smacked him over the back of the head as he prowled past.

“And nothing can get in or out if it has warm blood,” said Henjo with a shrug, “whatever that means.”

“What it says, I guess,” rumbled Markus. “Nothing alive?”

“Any vampires, raise your hand,” said Tobi. “No? We could send Weiki, he looks dead.”

“Funny. Have you been at the catnip again?”

Tobi scowled. “Low blow, Weikath.”

He arched one eyebrow. “Perhaps we should get you a scratching post? Then when you get the urge to say something stupid you can go and play with that instead. Or a ball. With a bell in it.”

Smirks shot around the group, with several sniggers thrown in for good measure. Tobi muttered under his breath, but subsided sulkily. Jens patted him on the shoulder, with a fake smile of consolation.

“This is getting us nowhere,” snapped Kai. “We must be able to get in!”

“Warm blooded, remember,” yawned Henjo. Now he was awake, all he wanted to do was go back to sleep. “The city was very firm on that point.”

Andi, still slumped against Markus, snapped his eyes open with annoyance. “Mike. If you have something to say, then say it. But muttering in my ear isn’t going to help anyone and it’s getting on my nerves.” 

He shut his eyes, and apparently went back to sleep. Everyone looked at Weiki, and he raked one hand through his hair, puffed out his cheeks, sighed.

“What?” asked Kai, and he shrugged.

“I can get in,” he said quietly.

~*~

Yoz had put it off for as long as possible without antagonising the sorceress but eventually it was time. She’d taken another shower, taken her sweet time dressing - her clothes had been returned clean and fresh, every item that had been in the pockets still in its place, present and correct. She fished in the pocket of her jacket, pulled out the miraculous globe that contained her room; she wondered what would happen to it, and just had to hope that the Weavers had something up their collective sleeves.

And weren’t just using this as a convenient excuse to get rid of her.

“Of course,” said Vega with a smile as they made their way toward her throne room, “you won’t actually be killed until midnight.”

No clocks in this place, but Yoz was damn sure it wasn’t midday yet. An uncomfortable feeling began to stir in the pit of her stomach, and she swallowed hard.

“Midnight, eh?” she replied, and sounded almost as strained as she felt. “Bit of a cliché, isn’t it?”

Vega shrugged. “The vampires would like a chance to see you die, and of course the Lord of Hell has a certain sense of... flair.”

“Melodrama, more like,” muttered the Magus, and stuffed her hands deeper into her pockets. 

She had a feeling it was going to be a very long afternoon.

~*~

There had been a good deal of arguing, but eventually they had to give in; Weiki said he could get in, refused to explain, so they would just have to take him at his word. The party would consist of Kai, Henjo - who insisted that he would be fine - and Dan of the Rays, Tobi, Felix and Dirk from the Edguys, and Markus, Dani and Sascha from the Helloween gang. And Weiki, of course, although he would be going in first.

The others would stay in public areas, gambling that nobody would take a pop at them in front of so many witnesses; with any luck the opposition would be so busy watching the others achieving the impossible (“Thank you,” said Kai, through his teeth, to Tobi when he phrased it like that) that they wouldn’t have time to worry about the stragglers.

Dirk wanted to come but he could hardly walk, so that was nixed; he slammed the door of his room and threw things for a while to calm himself, then turned all the lights out and crawled under the covers. Not only did his leg hurt, but he didn’t feel very well either. He felt - odd. Different, as though things were remaking themselves inside him, and he curled into a ball and hoped like Hell that they got the Magus out and returned her to him as fast as possible. She would sort this out, he was sure.

Kai began to assemble the weapons they would take with them; nothing that resembled a gun, of course, but plenty of wooden stakes, pickaxe handles, hammers, a solitary baseball bat and several fire axes.

“Where the Hell,” asked Sascha, wide eyed, “did you get that lot from?”

“Here and there,” said Kai. Then he pointed to the fire axes. “Those from the hotel, of course.”

“How did you get it all through customs?” he asked. The collection looked as though it had lurked at the bottom of Kai’s suitcase for a while.

“Told them they were yours.”

“Wha-- oh, funny. So what do I get to carry?”

“Take your pick,” said Kai, then hefted one of the long pickaxe handles. “Actually, take this; with your reach you can stop ‘em getting anywhere near us.”

Sascha gave the weapon an experimental swing, and smiled at the way it felt in his hands. Then his face fell, and he shot Kai a rather wretched look. “Um. Are there going to be people in there? Not vampires. You know, alive people.”

Kai hefted one of the axes and looked grim. “Not once I’ve finished with them there won’t be.”

~*~

It took them a good portion of the day to obtain suitable transport - the idea of just stealing it being vetoed as soon as Kai suggested it - but an hour before sunset they were on their way out to the derelict asylum. Weiki, slumped in the passenger seat of the leading SUV, kept glaring at the weather and muttering.

“What?” asked Kai, once several miles of sighing and maundering had gotten on his last nerve.

“At least it’s a warm day,” the other man grouched, but beyond that refused to be drawn. 

Down a private road and screened from the gaze of the world by a thick belt of trees they eventually found the place. Tall iron gates welcomed them with chains and padlocks; Tobi opened his mouth to say that perhaps this was a sign that they should leave, but Felix shot him a nasty glare and he subsided. Kai leaned out the window of his vehicle, then hopped out to go back and speak to Dani, at the wheel of the second.

“If we go that way,” he said, pointing at a rotted wooden fence across the shallow ditch at the side of the road, “we can get through and back on the road just beyond the gate. Can you do it?”

Dani stared at the gear shift, then shrugged. “This is why you got four wheel drives, isn’t it?”

Kai winked, but when he went to return to his car Dani stuck his head out the window of his own vehicle and called after him.

“Kai! How far out do these wards start? Are we going to cross that ditch and end up dead?”

The men in the car fell silent at Dani’s words, and a cloud of worry slammed down with an audible thunk to lie thick across them. Kai looked back, nodded; he walked to the front of his own car, leaned on the bonnet and closed his eyes. If he opened his senses he could feel the aura of the surroundings, the life in the leafless woods around them, the traces of madness and rot that emanated from the new inhabitants of the crumbling building behind the trees.

But of the delicate tracery of fire that would indicate magical defences there was no sign, and he trotted back to reassure Dani that all was well. That done, he returned to his own car, fired up the engine with a roar and slipped it into four wheel drive, spun the wheel to point the nose of the vehicle into the woods.

“We’re coming, Yoz,” he muttered, and floored it.

~*~

They parked up under the trees, the old hospital sprawled in elegant decay before them. What had once been ornamental gardens were now a ruin of scrub, and behind the bars broken windows gaped like hollow eyes. The whole place reeked of disuse and despair, and ghosts of the mad whispered in every shadow as the sun went down.

The ten men disembarked and stared at the place with some unease. Markus cocked an eye at the darkening blues overhead, then elbowed his friend.

“You’d better hurry. The sun is going down.”

“Vampires,” added Sascha with a shudder.

Weiki made his way to the back of one of the cars, lowered the tailgate, and began to undress. The others watched him, wide-eyed; why was he getting naked at a time like this? Surely if he’d had a Beast Yoz would have shown them, exposed him when she’d exposed the other three--

He turned and glared at them, flicked his cigarette end into the weeds. “Whatever you do,” he snapped, “nobody panic.”

Then he began to change.

To his knees, head down, hair being sucked back into his body as patterns began to flash across his skin. Woodland browns, streaks of black, patches of gleaming white; his arms melted into his sides, and his legs became one limb before they faded into an enormous, muscular tail. The semi-upright form slumped to its side, coils of muscle rubbed against each other with a dry hiss of ridged scales.

His face had lengthened, widened, and when he lifted it to regard them all it was the wedge-shaped head of a viper that swung to include them in his field of vision.

“Oh. My. God,” whispered Dan, and was more glad than ever that Eero had remained behind.

The tongue that flickered to taste the air was black, a gleam of movement in the bedimmed air. The eyes remained that shade of ice-blue that considered and measured, although the lack of eyelids made the stare even more intimidating than before.

“Nothing warm-blooded,” said Henjo, and laughed softly. Weiki angled his head, dipped it in acknowledgement - and then turned to stare at Tobi in what could only be described as a leer.

He sidled behind Dirk, and wouldn’t look the huge snake in the eye; fully twenty feet long and as thick around as Markus’ waist in the middle of his body he was the most terrifying beast that any of them had ever faced. And when he yawned, settled his jaws into a more comfortable position, the lances of the fangs that flicked out and folded back made more than one man cross himself and pray to see the dawn.

Sascha looked as though he was going to either faint or vomit, and Dani touched him on the arm.

“You OK?”

He blinked down at Dani, then harrumphed. “And I thought you were bad,” he muttered, breath tight in his throat. Dani chuckled, slapped him on the arm - and stayed well away from where the serpent had turned itself and was eyeing the derelict building.

Kai, once he’d got over the initial shock, took a deep breath and stepped closer to the snake.

“You know what you’re doing?”

That he didn’t flinch when the snake reared up and stared him in the face - from all of about eight inches - was the bravest thing any of them had ever seen him do. He folded his arms, and the snake dipped its nose twice in agreement.

“Get in there, find Yoz and get her to turn the wards off. Then we’ll come in and help.”

Another of those odd little head movements, and with sinuous grace the snake turned and slid away through the brush. Nine explosions of relieved breath, and everyone began to talk at once. Kai let them chatter for a while, exclaiming over the appearance of the huge reptile, then clapped his hands to catch their attention.

“Right, we need to be ready. I’ll watch the wards, and let you know when they go down; Henjo, you drive this car, Dan, Dani and Markus with us. The rest of you in the other one. OK?”

“But--” said Sascha, and Tobi punched his arm as he began to strip his shirt off. 

“You allergic to cats?” he asked with a grin, and Sascha swore at him.

Armed - or changed, depending on species - the nine men settled themselves in to watch, and wait. 

__

~~tbc~~


	17. Sixteen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "I wonder if she got the bear out," she said to herself, then shrugged one last time and got in the car.

_****_

Chapter Sixteen

Snakes are flexible creatures, able to compress and flatten themselves, contort and squeeze until they can get through just about any gap that they need to.

Weiki was, therefore, able to enter the building with ease.

Through the bars that covered a broken window, tough skin rejecting the splinters of smashed glass that would have shredded any mammalian exterior. The room beyond was dark, disused; a flicker of his forked tongue and he knew that rats, the occasional domestic cat and other wildlife had breezed through here recently, but nothing larger. Although beyond the smells of abandoned building, of rot and slow decay there were brighter scents, sharper.

He found a gap at the bottom of the mouldered door, squeezed through it, and slid on.

Two corridors in and he made a discovery that would have made him smile, had he been able to do so. But snake’s faces are not made for smiling, and he had to content himself with a gentle hiss and a flex of his fangs; the old hospital had once been heated by warm air, the building riddled with ducting more than large enough for him to traverse with ease. The smoothness of the surface was no problem, either; if he threw loops of himself forward he could push against those, and sidewind his way at more speed than anyone would have believed.

Dead things, vampires, rotting corpses - ah, and there it was. People. Quite a few of them.

But they smelled wrong, somehow; the human smell was diluted by something else, something so black and hideous that he felt a chill shudder through his already cold blood. Even so, he pressed on. If it lived - after whatever a fashion - it could die. And if it could die, he could kill it.

Unconcerned, he nevertheless thought it a good idea to search faster.

~*~

Guarding the sleeping places of the vampires was dull duty, but one to which most of Vega’s servants were well suited. A mix of the hopelessly insane, lost devotees of the Dark and those seduced by the sorceress’ power none of them were particularly good at original thought; the fact that within the mind of each lived a seed of the soul-killing Dark saw to that.

But they retained instincts, and something made this particular dull-eyed individual look up, a soft scrape behind the grille of an air vent catching his attention.

The vent exploded outwards, and the grille knocked him down when it impacted his chest. He tried to get up, gun lost, cry for help - but the snake was on him before he could do more than yelp. 

The venom silenced the guard in a heartbeat, and Weiki swung his head to examine the whole room. Vibrations of voices pulsated through the floor in the direction of an open door; there were people out there, so he had to be careful. But he was definitely getting closer to the centre of the maze, that was certain.

Nothing else moved in the dimly lit room, and with a final scan in the infra red - his species possessed a fine set of heat sensors not unlike those of a rattlesnake, although less obvious from the outside - he slithered back into the heating duct, and made his way toward his destination.

~*~

“Almost sundown,” said Vega, and wiped the sweat of effort from her brow. Yoz watched her from beneath her fringe, and didn’t reply. It had, as she had feared, been a very long afternoon indeed. “So I think it’s time for the final act to begin, don’t you?”

She cupped the Magus’ face in one palm, brushed a streak of blood from her cheek; then with a final kiss to Yoz’ bruised, swollen lips she turned away and began to draw out the circle that she would use to summon the Lord of Hell.

Candles flared to life around the large, white tiled room, and the brightness of the operating lamps began to dim; if she’d been able to spare any energy apart from just keeping herself breathing Yoz would have been impressed. Just like her own room this huge, mad facility responded to its mistress’ moods and needs, but she couldn’t analyse it now.

She just wondered where the Hell the boys were, and if they were going to try and help.

Vega paused in her construction, one hand filled with salt paused in the act of consecrating the dark circle. From the series of antechambers adjoining the throne room - once an operating theatre, accessed through various scrub and prep rooms - came shrieks and roars of terror, the staccato chatter of gunfire, and the sound of something large moving at speed. Ivory skin glistening with the sweat of the afternoon’s effort Vega moved to complete her task, brow furrowed in concentration. If she could summon the entity she sought before whatever the disturbance was reached here--

Too late, and the huge snake burst through the swinging double doors like a Mack truck on a rampage. 

The room exploded into chaos, human guards scattered in terror and the sorceress ran to the side in an attempt to dodge the vast reptile. Weiki was faster, and cut her off; snake and woman glared at each other for a moment, then she reached for the long knife belted at her waist. 

Weiki’s speed was far beyond anything that Vega could possibly achieve.

The snake spat, a jet of venom projected from the base of his fangs directly into the woman’s face. She fell without a cry, the agony great enough to steal even the breath needed for a scream.

Yoz grinned through her own pain, and tilted her head to look the Beast in his gleaming, ice blue eyes when he slid up to examine her sorry state.

“Cheers. The others are outside?”

A dip of the nose, and he nudged at her bound arms. She groaned at the pain, and he drew back.

“Yeah, no limbs - and your teeth aren’t exactly designed for chewing, are they? Besides which, you’d never get the nails out.”

The snake cocked his head, and glanced back down at the writhing body of the sorceress. Yoz cleared her throat with effort, spat blood.

“Vega. Vega!”

Now she was beginning to make noise, a babble of pain as the venom ate away at her face. Blood bubbled between her clasped fingers, the venom contained within it burning at the skin, blisters filled with bloodied fluid already starting to form.

“Oi! Fuck, give her a poke would you?”

The snake flowed back to the floor, and administered a series of hard nudges with his bony nose. 

“Drop the wards and I’ll take away the pain. You know I can do it.”

To her relief she felt the jerk in her mind that indicated the release of the magic, the defences of the asylum dropped to enable the warm blooded to get in - and out. Yoz sagged in her bonds and prepared to wait; once the guys got here then she would most certainly ease the sorceress’ pain - probably by getting the snake to finish the job. He prowled the throne room, restless slither of dry scales across the cold tile, ever alert to the possibility of further attack.

A deep rumble, the sound of movement all around and Yoz cursed between her teeth; she hoped that the cavalry were on their way, because the vampires were now awake.

~*~

“That’s it! The wards are down!” yelled Kai, and Henjo started up his car with a roar. Dirk booted the other to life, and prepared to follow Henjo’s lead; he shot Kai a quick glance, wondered where they should go.

“In through the front door,” he said, his grin wolfish, “right down their fucking throats.”

He gripped his axe in one hand, and braced himself with the other as Henjo shot the huge vehicle forward, aiming it straight at the wide front doors of the asylum.

The impact was horrendous, but somehow Henjo managed to hang on to control. Through the doors they drove into a large, marble floored reception area, its subdued elegance long gone to dust and rot. Both vehicles plunged through the wreckage, headlights illuminating in stark monochrome shades the destruction, then slithered to an ungainly halt. The ‘shifters leaped from the vehicles before they were fully stationary, one cat taking station on each roof to watch for attack from the sides, Dani on the bonnet of Kai’s truck to watch the darkness before them.

“Which way?” yelled Sascha, waving his torch to show a series of corridors that all led away from the now wrecked reception. Kai stretched his mind, found the gleam of magic through the waves of black hate and anger that buffeted him from all directions.

“Toward the centre,” he called back, and tore off in that direction with Dani at his side. The others followed in an untidy gaggle, and that was when the vampires attacked.

~*~

It became a melée in the dark, flashes of torchlight doing little more than thickening the darkness when it dropped back over them once more. The changed ‘shifters took the brunt of the violence, as their dark-adapted vision allowed them to see so much more of the flow of attack; Tobi’s black coat rendered him almost invisible, only the occasional flash of a white tail tip or paw giving away his position. The humans had clumped together into small groups of two and three, each making the attempt to defend the other’s back, panic held at bay only by sheer effort of will.

Sascha, much to his own surprise, now led the way; his reach with the pickaxe handle and the power behind each swing had earned him a wary space, even the vampires unwilling to get their skulls crushed in by a titanic blow from the bloodstained hickory. Kai shot past him, bloody to the eyebrows, axe wielded with dreadful efficiency and many a ferocious war cry.

“This way!” he yelled, but was stopped by a strangled yelp from behind.

The shrieks and howls of battle paused, then fell to near silence; they looked back, and as one their hearts sank.

Markus and Henjo stood, frozen to the spot, a blonde vampire between them with a hand wrapped around each throat.

“Gentlemen,” growled Jaan, “this foolishness stops. Now.”

~*~

Kai stepped forward. “Let them go.”

“No,” said the vampire, a grin stretching his face as he stared at the shorter man, “no, I don’t think I will.”

Gunfire echoed from further inside the building, and the men shifted and murmured at the sound. If they didn’t overcome this threat and start moving again soon, they would be overrun.

“That will be your other comrade being finished off,” said the vampire lightly, “and now I am going to take these two - right here, in front of you - and then we will go and pay our respects to our Mistress and watch your Magus die.”

“You expect us to go along with this?” asked Dan, through clenched teeth.

“No,” said the vampire, “I expect you to die. After a certain amount of pointless struggle, of course.”

He nuzzled the side of Markus’ neck, and Kai braced himself for the jump forward that he had to make, the leap that would, no doubt, be the last thing he ever did. But he had to _try--_

Loud bangs - door slams, the sound of steel and bars being forced shut at speed and with force - brought the vampire’s head up with a jerk. He frowned, looked as though he might speak and then a long black streak of _something_ flashed across their heads, and hit the blonde vampire square in the chest. 

It was another of the undead, and their fight was savage in the extreme. The newcomer slashed at Jaan’s face, blinded him, pinned him to the filthy rubble of the floor - then held out one taloned hand toward the humans as his prey writhed beneath his knees.

“Stake,” he snapped.

“What?” said Dan. The vampire snarled, lips drawn back from teeth that gleamed in the torchlight.

“I’m on your side, idiot. Give - me - a - stake! Now!”

“Traitor,” gurgled the blonde vampire, and then exploded into dust as the wood split his black heart in two. Markus and Henjo shook themselves, yelled in horror at finding themselves so close to another bloodsucker. They ran to join the others, and the vampire raised his hands in supplication as they advanced on him en masse, weapons raised.

“There isn’t much time,” he said. “The banging you heard? That was most of the facility being closed off. We should get a straight run through to the throne room now, and you’ll only have to deal with the ones that are already through. I’ll help you with that.”

“And who the Hell are you?” asked Dirk, pushing the brim of his baseball cap up to peer at the newcomer.

“My name is James. I’m the representative of the vampire Council that--”

“--put the worm in Yoz’ head,” growled Kai, and hefted his axe.

“And took it out!” the vampire protested. “Look, we have to move! Valdrin says that--”

“Who is Valdrin?” asked Markus with a frown, and James slapped a hand over his eyes.

“Oh no....”

“This element of the observers of the weave of space and time is known to the uninitiated and the unenlightened of our Mother universe’s children as Valdrin,” said a voice from the shadows, and the Weaver stepped forward to join them. James flapped his hands at them.

“Don’t ask or we’ll be here all night!” he said. “Now, can we go, please?”

“Go where?”

“To save the Magus, of course,” said James with a grin, and slapped Kai on the arm as he ran past. “Come on, last one to the throne room is a rotten egg!”

In moments the corridor was abandoned to nothing more than drifted dust, and the fading echoes of violence.

~*~

Despite James’ assertion that the way was open it was still slow progress. Enough of the insane human guards - their eyes assuming the wet blackness from edge to edge that the Rays remembered so well from the attack under Antarctica - had slipped through to give them real problems, although James managed to keep the worst of the vampires from them. 

“Almost there!” he yelled, and slammed a stake through the chest of another vampire. Sascha swung the pickaxe handle at his head and he ducked with a yelp; a sick crunch from behind him stopped the roar he’d drawn breath to give the young man. Behind him lay one of the asylum guards, wooden stake clutched in his now-dead hand, and head stove in by the tremendous impact.

Sascha extended a bloodied hand, and James accepted the help up with a laugh. 

The attackers thinned out, and the ‘shifters were able to scout ahead; Tobi scrambled back a heartbeat later, his expression one of such total horror that his whiskers bristled. He flowed back into the halfway form, swiped the throat out of a hapless human guard that tried to point a gun at him, and shook his head.

“You gotta come quick,” was all he said, melted back down to four feet and charged away again.

Kai was the first one through the door, and his stop was so sudden that the others all piled into the back of him; in the end the six humans formed a tight huddle in the double doors, and stared in horror at the vista before them.

It was a scene straight from the jaws of Hell itself.

Tobi, Felix and Dani all fought like tigers, each one with at least three of the black-eyed avatars of the Dark on them. Their enemies were far too badly damaged to sustain life, but while the Dark force animated them they fought on.

It was the snake that drew their attention first, however. 

They knew he could move fast; they knew he was big and powerful and dangerous. That much had been obvious from the first moment that they realised what he was. 

What they hadn’t realised was quite _how_ fast, manoeuvrable and downright lethal he was. Running with blood from hundreds of cuts and bullet wounds he flung his body back and forth, the pointed nose driven direct into the middle of whatever had touched him, every strike centred and powerful enough to smash aside the adversary. His fangs dripped venom that hissed and bubbled where it touched the floor, and many of the lumps that crawled around the periphery of the room had no faces, blood and fluids leaking from the ruin of tissue dissolved by the snake’s attack.

It didn’t matter where they were when they touched or tried to strike at him, as he seemed to be able to fling himself an entire body length in any direction; his mottled and striped body was everywhere, the snarl of rough scales along the smooth tile of the room underlying the zip of bullets and the shrieks of the mammalian warriors.

Then their gaze was drawn to the far end of the room, a circle of power scuffed and neglected in front of a tall wooden construction bolted to the wall. Vega crawled beneath it, one hand over her face, wailing, and Yoz hung above; mismatched eyes glared from a too-pale face, her entire body stained with blood, her clothes hung in rags.

She’d been crucified.

~*~

They plunged into the fight, the fear of an accidental bite from the furious snake a real concern; he shook his great head at the first near miss, and solved the problem by surging to the base of the makeshift crucifix. He pinned Vega to the floor with his body, and dared any to approach.

They left him to it, concentrated on clearing the last of the undead servants of the Dark from the room; by the time they had them all incapacitated Yoz's eyes were closed, her head hung down in an attitude of defeat. Kai took a deep breath, shook himself, then ran across the blood-slick floor toward her; Weiki reared up in warning, fangs bared, head drawn back into the classic s-shape of attack and eyes fierce with anger. 

Kai almost killed himself pulling up before the attack was launched; better a broken neck on the slick floor than an attack from the deadly venom.

“Fucking Hell, Weiki!” yelled Sascha, and with something that Kai would have sworn was a smirk on the reptilian face he slid away to one side, the motion as fluid as ever despite the numerous wounds.

The others gave ground, but Kai glared at the huge Beast as it passed him.

“Asshole,” he muttered, and the snake just flickered its tongue.

At the base of the crucifix Kai looked up. The Magus was bound to it with chains, which appeared to support most of her weight; however, long nails had been driven through wrists, elbows, knees and feet - just for good measure, he supposed. Her clothing had been cut from her to leave no more than shreds of underwear, her face showed evidence of a serious beating and her arms had been sliced in long, shallow gashes from which blood still dripped, albeit at a very slow rate.

And he couldn’t reach her.

She wobbled her head up.

“You took your fucking time,” she grumbled, then - to his astonishment - winked.

“Sascha!” he yelled, “give me a hand with this, would you?”

Between Sascha, Markus and Dan they managed to pry the cross from the wall, get it laid flat. Weiki had taken station curled up atop the sorceress, who continued to shake and cry - but made no move to escape. James, who had fought beside them the whole way, began to examine the nails.

“Markus,” he said, “have you still got that hammer?”

“Gonna push them out the other side?” she asked, regarding the vampire with some distaste. He snorted, and examined the tool that Markus had handed over with some reluctance.

“Course not,” he muttered, then analysed the bloody head of the instrument, eyes narrowed in concentration. Long fingers flicked hair and flesh that had become stuck to it away, and he smiled. “See,” he said, “this side knocks them in,” and he turned it over to show the claws on the back of the solid steel head, “this pulls them out. You ready, Magus?”

“No,” she muttered, and closed her eyes.

“Hold her,” said James, and applied the claws to the exposed head of the nail through her left wrist.

Then he put one foot on her arm, and pulled.

~*~

Markus, on the pretext of going to see if there was any pursuit, had left the room and now leaned against the wall in the corridor, cigarette firmly grasped in trembling hand. The shriek when the vampire had yanked out the first nail had been bad enough; but the howls of sheer agony as he calmly went about removing the others had made him feel sick. She’d begged, the pain nearly more than even she could bear; begged him to wait, to cut the wood first, to let Kai magic them out - _anything_ \- but then he’d carried on anyway.

Kai had, after the third one, grabbed James’ arm and demanded that he stop, but he’d shrugged and turned away to do the next one.

“We have to get out of this place,” he’d said, “and this is the fastest way to do it.”

The howling had stopped, and with a last glance up and down the corridor - all quiet - Markus flicked his cigarette butt into the shadows and returned to the filthy, gore-splashed throne room. Kai and Henjo unwound the chains, freed her one broken limb at a time until Kai could slide one arm under her back and prop her up into a sitting position, the Magus letting out a strained keen of agony when he did so.

She placed one bloodied hand over his heart, and shut her eyes.

“A little shine, please,” she muttered, and he nodded.

Before too much longer she looked far more herself, although Kai swayed a bit and appeared pale. She unfolded, stood up and stretched; then crossed the room in three quick strides and seized the vampire by the front of the shirt, gave him a hard shake then dropped him with a snarl. He flinched when she drew a hand back, but she just patted his cheek.

“Thanks for getting the nails out,” she said with a smile.

“You’re a psychopath,” he snorted, and she tilted her head.

“You think? I tell you what, mate, you wait till we meet again on some dark night down an alley somewhere. Then I really will go psycho on your vampire ass.”

He couldn’t hide the smirk, but it was when the tall, spare figure of the Weaver made his way into the room that she really got angry.

“You son of a _bitch_. Where the hell were you? Things that had to happen my furry arse - did you see what she did to me? Fucking bitch _crucified_ me, Valdrin! With nails! _Big_ ones! What the fuck was so important that you could let that happen you hypocritical, lying, scumsucking motherhumping useless spunkbubble?”

The Weaver bowed, and with fists bunched she stepped toward him. He raised his hand, shook his head; she opened her mouth to shriek at him again, but his calm words overran her furious ones.

“The magic by which she was to summon your collectors had to be set in motion - the mark in the pattern of the Weave is indelible and no amount of negotiation or dealing with whatever Powers lurk above or below will ever remove it, now or then or until our Mother universe passes away into fiery nothingness. Furthermore--”

He removed her bag from his shoulder and passed it to her, along with her jacket. She shrugged into it, and glared.

Yoz snorted. “OK, fine, enough. But I promised her I would stop her pain, and I will.”

She stalked around the room, kicked at the various corpses and turned others over with feet or hands until she found what she was looking for. She worked the bolt on the machine pistol a few times, made sure the magazine contained plenty of ammunition. Once she was satisfied, she stalked over to the form of the snake, then beckoned Kai closer.

“I need a bit more shine,” she said, “and Weiki, move your scaly butt.”

She took a deep breath, slung the machine pistol over one shoulder and took Kai’s hand. With the other she pointed at the sorceress, and the gentle whisper of magic filled the room.

Healing magic.

“What are you _doing?_ ” asked Henjo, between gritted teeth.

Yoz stopped, let go of Kai, and pulled the gun back until she had it pointed at the groggy other woman, now on her knees. Wearing little more than a wrap-around skirt in some filmy material and a sports bra - both tattered and burnt from the effects of the venom that had splashed across her - she looked up, straight into the barrel of the gun, and snarled at her enemy. Of her beauty there was little left, her face ravaged and burned, the flesh bubbled, raw.

“I want her to see it coming,” said Yoz softly. “Any objections, gents?”

“Gloating, Yoz?” croaked the sorceress, and the Magus shrugged.

But between tightening her finger on the trigger and actually firing the space before her became empty; Vega had vanished.

~*~

The men dived for cover; in her fury Yoz sprayed the room with bullets, her scream of frustrated rage echoing from the blood-streaked walls of the chamber. The deadly rain only stopped when the snake leaped at her, hit her dead centre and knocked her flat. Then he curled his huge body up on top of her, and refused to get off.

Sulfurous curses came from under the coils of the snake, but eventually the words calmed; the snake didn’t move, however, until she was heard to ask him to do so in a much more polite fashion. He slid sideways, and she brushed the worst of the filth from herself before staggering to her feet.

“Fine. Let’s go.”

Six men, two cats, one rat, one snake and a vampire stared at her as though she’d lost her mind.

“That’s it? You’re not going to chase her?”

The Magus shrugged. “What’s the fucking point? She’s better at translocation than I am, and I haven’t got the fucking energy anyway. I could use all Kai’s shine, wear poor Weiki’s fangs to nubs and exhaust the lot of you and I still wouldn’t find her. Where’s that fucking Weaver?”

James shrugged. “Gone. Shall we go, Magus?” he asked, and offered her his arm. She looked at the destruction, at the tired and bloody forms of her friends, and sighed.

“You know, James,” she said, “for a vampire? You’re not so bad. But it’ll be a cold day in Hell before I walk anywhere with you willingly.”

And so saying she took Kai’s arm, and marched out of the room.

“Bitch,” muttered the vampire.

Markus patted him on the shoulder with some sympathy, then followed them out.

~*~

Once they reached the vehicles Dirk and Henjo reassumed their positions in the driver’s seats, and the others retreated through the smashed doors to wait outside. The moon was up, half full; the silver lambency lent a serenity to the scene that it didn’t deserve, and made the blood that covered them all into a tarry black stain.

One car, then the next pulled out, bounced across the wreckage and down the steps and the ‘shifters began to flow back into their human forms. They grabbed clothes and shrugged into them before the cold of the night soaked into their bones, human flesh no defence against the wicked winter chill. Weiki moved slowest, the temperature affecting his physiology far more than that of the mammals. Sascha and Markus hoisted him into one of the cars, wrapped him in a blanket and turned the heater right up, propped him directly over one of the vents.

His teeth chattering, he nevertheless managed to light a cigarette and sighed in relief as he took a long, slow drag on it.

“Worst thing about doing that,” he grumbled when Sascha shook his head at him, “no fucking fingers.”

Once they were all aboard and Yoz had pinched Sascha’s shirt - which came to her knees - to cover her near-nakedness she snapped her fingers and turned back to the derelict asylum, the structure squatting in the moonlight like a great, poisonous toad.

“One last thing,” she said, and spread her fingers toward it.

For a moment nothing happened, then the ground beneath their feet trembled; a deep crack, as of Hell knocking at the underside of the concrete, and an explosion. She narrowed her eyes, waved her hand in a come-on-more gesture, and bared her teeth for joy when flames roared from the roof.

Heads poked out of the car windows, eyes wide with astonishment as she goaded and drove the flames; within minutes the entire building was ablaze, end to end, the bars on the windows glowing red hot with the destructive force that bellowed within.

“Yoz,” said Kai, quietly, “weren’t there still people in there?”

She shrugged. “Not any more,” she told him, and he pulled his head back thought the window with a slightly sickened expression.

Just before she climbed into the back seat herself - more than ready to doze her way back to the hotel and then a day or three’s sleep - she looked back over her shoulder at the burning building, and sighed.

“I wonder if she got the bear out,” she said to herself, then shrugged one last time and got in the car.

__

~~tbc~~


	18. Seventeen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The smug expression had Markus and Andi snorting helplessly. "Yes. After all, when it came down to it, who was the only one of real use in an emergency? Not the rat or the cats...."

_****_

Chapter Seventeen

Yoz had no recollection of the drive back; she’d curled up between Dan and Kai and promptly passed out, snoring a little through her bruised nose. None of them spoke, not even when a trio of fire engines tore past them, sirens loud and lights ablaze; someone must have seen the flames from a distance and called the emergency services. They doubted that they would be able to put the fire out until the structure was totally destroyed, and just hoped that nobody else got hurt.

There’d been plenty of pain already.

Once they reached the hotel Kai poked the Magus awake. She cracked one eye open, and the clear blue that was revealed regarded him suspiciously.

“What?”

“We’re here.”

She snorted, and turned away from him to burrow into Dan’s chest. “Oh, save me from fools and redheads, Daniel.”

Dan laughed, shuffled her around until she was cradled in his arms. She glanced over her shoulder and stuck her tongue out at Kai, who rolled his eyes.

“We have to talk about Dirk,” he told her once they were all disembarked from the vehicles, Yoz still curled up in the drummer’s arms.

“Yeah? What about him?” she replied sleepily, before adding, “and you might want to give some thought to hiding us as we go in. That fire’s going to be big news, and we’ve got ‘suspicious’ written all over us in six foot letters of fire right now.”

“Me?”

“You remember how, don’t you?” she yawned, and then apparently went back to sleep.

“Fuck,” he muttered, and called everyone back. He told them what was going to happen - to a silent chorus of raised eyebrows and apparent disbelief - and then closed his eyes and engaged his Other sight. There they all were, auras as clear as day against the background chatter of life; he made the necessary adjustments, paced around the group a few times, and nodded.

“I can still see us,” said Markus, puzzled.

“It’s worked, trust me,” replied Kai. “Come on, before it wears off.”

~*~

The receptionist was bored. Not only had she been given the worst shift of all - ten at night until six in the morning - but at this time of year the hotel was almost empty, and thus there was very little to do. She’d hoped that having three bands of rockstars and associated crew staying for a few days would liven the place up - but so far, not a thing.

She went back to her magazine, tried to concentrate.

A flicker of sound, a suggestion of movement at the corner of her eye and she looked up; the main door drifted open, apparently by itself, and then held before beginning the slow drift shut again.

Eyes wide, she watched it for a little longer. No more movement; perhaps she’d imagined it. These long, dull night shifts were sometimes a bit like that - you could get to the stage where you couldn’t tell if you were awake or asleep.

The soft dings as three of the lifts arrived at the same time, doors opened and then shut again brought her to her feet. OK, that was weird; they all headed off to the same floor, paused, then began the long drop back to the lobby. They certainly weren’t supposed to do that, and she felt an odd prickly feeling on the back of her neck.

The hotel couldn’t be--

No. Haunted hotel?

Get a grip.

That was when she glanced down at the polished marble of the lobby floor, and saw the footprints. Lots of footprints, as though a sizeable group of people with dirty feet had trooped across her nice clean reception area.

She sat back down, picked up her magazine, and resolved not to look up for the rest of her shift.

~*~

By the time Kai got to his own room Yoz was in the shower, humming to herself and obscured by a billowing cloud of steam. He took off his jacket, leaned on the door of the bathroom; he could just see her through the fog and the shower screen, using all the complimentary toiletries and sounding far more cheerful than you would expect.

Considering that she’d been crucified a little earlier in the day.

“Come on in, the water’s lovely,” she called, and laughed.

He did go in, sat down on the toilet seat and rested his elbows on his knees. It felt good just to sit still, to let his senses absorb what was happening around him and not actually _do_ anything. He was tired, and he wanted to go home.

The shower shut off with a squeak, and then the Magus was knelt on the tiled floor in front of him. Her skin gleamed wet from the shower, flushed pink with heat between the darker scrawls of the ink; she hadn’t taken the time to towel off, and the floor around his feet sported a growing puddle where the water still dripped from her.

“What’s the matter?” she asked, and he tilted his head to the side and gave her a wry smile.

“Ah, nothing. Just looking forward to this break - if I actually get it.”

Seven days to the next gig. A week, long enough to fly home and take some personal time, then the last four shows in quick succession - relatively speaking, of course. It had been a rather leisurely pace compared to a tour that would support an album, but it wasn’t as though there hadn’t been plenty going on to occupy his attention. But just as he could have expected things to settle down - Yoz safe, the ‘shifters satisfied that she’d completed her mission for them, even the vampires off her back for a bit - it looked as though they might get even more complicated.

Vega was alive, out there, and angry.

And then there was Dirk.

Kai explained the whole sorry business, from the moment Yoz had been taken in the apartment through the attack by the wolf, the vampire ambush, and then his subsequent abuse of Henjo’s talent and the fact that it had almost cost his best friend his sanity. And his other best friend, from what Dani and Felix had told him, might also lose his mind when it was confirmed that he was going to turn into a monster every full moon from now until the day he died.

By the time he finished they were sprawled on his bed, she in a hotel robe and he fully dressed apart from having taken his shoes off. He lay on his back, stared at the ceiling and gloomily smoked a cigarette; one step forward and two back, that’s what his life had become. Or some kind of... circus.

“Hey. It’s not like that, you know,” she said quietly.

“Fucking feels like it.”

“I hate to say this,” she told him, stole one of his cigarettes and lit it with a snap of her fingers, “but I believe I did mention once or twice that this magic lark wasn’t all white doves and rabbit crap. But I think you didn’t entirely believe me, did you Mr. Hansen?”

“That,” he replied, rolling his head to one side to glare at her, “was a way of saying ‘I told you so’ worthy of a Weaver.”

“I try,” she grinned, but sobered when she didn’t receive a smile in return. She reached out and poked his shoulder. “Look, you’ve had - pardon the pun - a Hell of a time over the last, what, two years? First Dirk’s demon--”

“Then Hanne,” he said softly.

“Then the war, now this. There’s no wonder you’re fed up of it all.”

He rolled onto his side to face her. “Yoz, when is it ever going to stop? All I want to do is make music...” and the heaved sigh shook him from head to toe, weariness and disillusion having taken their toll. His glow, she noticed, that irrepressible shine that so drew every creature to him, was muted; wrapped in a cloud of unhappiness it flickered, damped low, almost on the verge of fading away altogether.

“Well,” she said, and ran her fingers across his cheek, “first things first. Next show is Stockholm, in a week - right?”

He nodded.

“I’d like to keep everyone together, if that’s possible - Vega is still out there, and there’s no knowing what the mad bitch will try next. She might decide to slaughter you all just to piss me off.”

Kai closed his eyes, and Yoz chose to ignore the flicker of pain that crossed his features when she said that. Get the immediate out of the way, then run damage control.

“Lots of open space near Stockholm,” she continued, the practical flip of her tone bringing him up on his elbows, “and cabins, secure places. Summerhouses, holiday homes, call them what you will, and they often get hired out in the winter to nutters from warmer climes who enjoy being up to their asses in snow. And you can explain it as a need for the bands to relax, maybe work on some new material - you’re a smart cookie, you’ll figure something out.”

He nodded thoughtfully. “Weiki won’t like it,” he said, and his smile began to creep around the edges of his lips again. Yoz stubbed out her cigarette with a snort.

“Weiki can do as he’s damn well told, or I’ll lock his arse into his Beast and drop him in a snowdrift. Now. You need to go and spend some quality time with Henjo and I,” she continued, “need to go talk to Dirk.”

She kissed him on the cheek and hopped off the bed, but stopped in the doorway. One hand on the frame she turned back, and eyed the man on the bed with a wry smile.

“It’ll be OK in the end, Kai. Promise.”

Brown eyes met the familiar mismatched gaze, and his smile was lopsided but genuine.

“Promise?”

She winked, and was gone.

~*~

The man she’d come to see was no more than a lump under the quilt, his snores soft. She came through the door - most people would have needed a key card, but she really couldn’t be bothered - and the snores stopped, the mound freezing in place for a second before Dirk’s head popped out and blue grey eyes narrowed suspiciously in her direction.

“Your senses are getting sharper,” she said, although she remained by the door, “interesting.”

“Don’t you start,” he grumbled, then flipped the covers back. “Come to bed.”

She shed the robe and climbed in beside him. They curled around each other, refamiliarised themselves with feel and smell and presence; then Dirk nuzzled into her hair, and sighed.

“I suppose they’ve told you what happened?” he asked.

“Yeah.”

“What do you think?”

She closed her eyes. So much pain. 

“What do you want me to tell you, Dirk?” she asked him softly. “That I can take it away? Because I can’t. Not and leave you still breathing, anyway; once it’s in your system it’s there to stay. Irreversible and permanent, I’m sorry to say.”

He sagged against her, the force of his despair an almost physical blow. She took his face between her hands, tilted it until she could stare into it. His eyes were tight shut, lines of fear etched deep into his skin.

“Like the demon,” he said, and the words burned through her. The force of remembered grief, of pain--

“No,” she said. “No, no, no.” Each word was punctuated by a gentle kiss. “This is very different. The demon wanted to destroy you; they exist to hurt and to kill, to cause torment any way they can. This is not the same.”

“I’m a monster,” he murmured, and tried to turn away from her.

“Oh for fuck’s sake,” she growled, and before he could wonder at the irritation in her voice she’d rolled him to his back, and pinned him. “Now you listen to me,” she snapped. “Is Dani a monster? Felix? Tobi’s an arse, but he isn’t a monster. Right?”

Dirk opened his mouth to object, then closed it again when she tightened her thighs on him in warning.

“I’m far more of a monster than you’ll ever know, but I’m not a ‘shifter. Vega’s a monster, but she isn’t one either. Just because you’re one doesn’t mean you’re the other, and has the thought occurred that this is the best thing that could have happened to you?”

He shook his head. “OK, that went by a little fast. It could what?”

A hard finger in his ribs made him yelp. “What did you use to defend yourself - and us - in Kai’s apartment when the demon tried to get at us all?”

“Um... ow! Yoz! Fine. It was the darkness. Hey!”

She poked him again, the sharp digs enough to make him wriggle and yell until she was grinning and even he snorted with amusement. “The darkness that...?” she continued, resuming the barrage of pokes when he hesitated to fill in the rest of the sentence.

“The darkness that the demon used,” he finished, and she slumped onto his chest with the relief that he’d got the right answer.

“Damn, I so don’t have the energy for this,” she grumbled, then propped her chin on her fist and stared down into his face. “Yeah, the darkness that the demon sensed and used. That’s a part of you, so it can’t be got rid of - where do you think that will hide now?”

He blinked.

“It’ll hide in your Beast. And once a month it’ll get let out to run and play and satiate itself.”

She rolled off him, curled into his side. “So don’t think of it as a curse, think of it as a way to exorcise the darkness in you. You can even,” and she yawned, “think of it as a penance, should you be so inclined.”

He pulled her close, stroked her hair. She’d given him a few things to think about, to be sure; he wasn’t too certain he could ever look at it as a good thing, but at least his outlook wasn’t quite so bleak now.

“Why are you so tired, anyway?” he asked her. “What happened out there?”

“I got --” and her words were mumbled into his shoulder.

“You what?”

“I got mumblemumblerhubard.”

Now he began to poke, and she shot up with a shriek before he rolled her, pinned her to the bed and grinned wolfishly.

“What?”

A theatrical roll of her eyes.

“Come on, Yoz.”

“I got crucified, OK?”

It took her several minutes to talk him out of the shock, and then nothing would do but that she gave him the whole story; by the time she was done the sun had begun to peek through the curtains, and she was on the verge of begging him to let her get just five minute’s sleep.

He held her close, watched her drift off into slumber; and while she slept and twitched and muttered in her dreams he began to think about the future. And he began to make some plans.

~*~

Woken up and dragged down to the hotel bar for a late lunch Yoz dozed over her beer; one hand propped up the side of her face and she let her eyes drift shut, the chatter of the men around her fading into so much meaningless white noise. A cigarette clutched between her fingers made its slow way toward being all ash, and Tobi spied an opportunity for mischief.

Eyes tracked the man as he prowled - with extreme caution - toward his quarry; Dirk was at the bar getting another drink, which left her with none to defend her while she napped. Elbows nudged, but the noise level never dipped; that would have alerted her to what approached, and there was curiosity to see what the mad little bastard would come up with this time to annoy the Magus.

And if she’d make good on her promise that the next time he tried something she’d nail him to the nearest wall.

He made good use of his stealth, and she dozed on unaware. Closer, one more step; he reached out for the cigarette packet in front of her, opened his fingers--

Fast enough to make even Weiki blink her hand snapped out, grabbed Tobi around the wrist and bent it back at such an angle that he immediately dropped to his knees to save it being broken. Mismatched eyes blinked sleepily, then a very nasty smile began to twist her mouth.

“What did I say I was going to do if you tried this again, Sammet?”

He writhed and squeaked, but didn’t reply until she gave his arm an extra cruel twist.

“Ow! Ow! You said you were going to nail me to a wall Yoz let go, _you’re hurting me!_ ”

His words hung in the air, and her knuckles whitened. All of a sudden the atmosphere had changed; she wasn’t playing now, and the expression in her eyes scared Tobi more than he’d been even in Vega’s horrible throne room. The bones of his wrist creaked under the crush of her grip, and he closed his eyes. When the bones shattered and exploded through his skin he really didn’t want to see it, and every instinct he possessed told him that she was going to do it.

“Let him go,” said a voice, and Tobi had never been so glad to hear Kai. Ever.

She didn’t move, and the microscopic tighten of her fingers into his flesh dragged a thin wail from his throat.

“I said let him go,” snapped Kai, “ _now_.”

Her fingers flicked open, and Tobi fell over with relief. He lay on the carpet, shut his eyes and rubbed at his bruised and aching wrist, and swore to himself that he really was going to stop baiting the Magus when she’d had a bad day.

“Tobias,” she snapped, giving him a quick kick where he lay near her feet, “I’d like you and Felix to talk to Dirk, warn him what to expect. I assume I can rely on you both to accompany him through his first change?”

He climbed to his feet, wrist cradled close to his chest and eyes wary. “Sure.”

“Good. And now the damn worm is out of my head I think I’m going to spend some time in my room.”

With that she left, the men watching her go with some astonishment. Dirk returned, stood by Kai and frowned.

“What the fuck was all that about?” Kai asked, and Dirk took a seat next to a still-shocked Tobias with a shrug.

“She’s tired and she’s stressed out, Kai. She needs a break as badly as we do.”

Kai flung his hands in the air and swore. “She’s not allowed to have a fucking breakdown, we don’t have time,” he muttered, and set off to follow her.

~*~

The closet in Dirk’s room would do, she decided. She was tired and angry - as much at herself for the loss of control down in the bar as at anything or anyone else - and honestly couldn’t be bothered to find anywhere more appropriate. Stuff appearances, she wanted some comfort and was bloody well going to have it. Kai, Henjo and Dirk could all find her if there was a problem, so until then--

She laid the marble on the floor of the empty closet, closed the door, and released the magic. She felt it unfold, the shiver in reality bringing a genuine smile to her face; the anticipation of being able to return to her comfort zone for the first time in what seemed like forever was something she’d been looking forward to ever since the first flares of agony when James had killed the worm.

A step through the closet door, and she was in a different world.

~*~

Kai couldn’t find her. She wasn’t in any of the rooms, and he knocked on doors and paced until it occurred to him to look with more than just his human-basic set of senses.

He leaned against the wall, the muted lighting and neutral colours of the corridor an asset to the exercise; hooding his eyes he opened his mind, explored his surroundings with the creeping tendrils of his awareness that the Magus had shown him how to use. 

And there it was. Not the sense of self or the strange, inhuman aura that would have revealed the physical presence of the Magus but a hitch in the flow of normal space and time, an anomaly that could be just one thing. She’d opened her room, and the odd little universe revealed itself only by the mild irritation in the flesh of the one in which it had been lodged.

Dirk’s room. Figured.

He grinned, and set off. She was going to discover that she wasn’t the only one could pick locks with her mind.

~*~

Leather creaked, the smell and the sound and the feel of her comfortable old chair wrapped around her weary and abused body bringing with it a long-anticipated sense of peace. She shuffled her shoulders a little deeper, and cradled the goblet of mulled wine close to her chest; her room had been overjoyed to see her, and she’d had to spend some minutes just roaming and admiring before it had let her sit down in peace.

The fire crackled, pine scenting the air each time a bubble of resin popped in the flames. The lights were dimmed, the beams that arched overhead and the fine traceries of the stone lost in the flickering gloom. Once she was sure she’d be left alone she was going to retreat to the bedroom annexe, with more wine and a couple of good books and her smokes, and the waking world could go to Hell.

It was with wry amusement that her room warned her of Kai’s approach; his knock was thunderous, and she gave some serious thought to ignoring it. That brought a curl of disapproval in the air, and she dropped her feet from her desk with a snort.

“What are you,” she murmured, canted an eye at the ceiling fondly, “my mother?”

By the time she’d wandered across to the huge oak portal it sounded as though Kai was using both fists, and adding the occasional kick for good measure.

“Easy there tiger,” she said to him when she pulled the door open. He stormed past her, pulled up in the middle of the floor and folded his arms. “What?” she said, and returned to her seat behind the desk. “And here. Looks like it’s pleased to see you, anyway.”

Kai looked at the desk, and smiled when he saw the goblet there. He took it, raised it to the air. “Thank you,” he said, and executed an elegant little bow before taking a sip. “Good,” he added, then turned to eye the sofa that had appeared behind him. “I think,” he said to the scowl the Magus was directing at him, “that it wants us to be comfortable while we talk.”

With a mutter under her breath about inanimate objects that were far more animate than they ought to be, she slouched across to join him on the sofa and curled up on one end of it, eyeing him with a certain amount of displeasure when he sprawled comfortably on the other. He raised his goblet to her, and they drank in silence for a while.

“So what happened down there?” he asked her quietly, and she turned away to stare at the fire.

“You’re not the only one who’s tired,” she told him at last. “I’ve been pushed about as far as I can go, Kai. I knew what he was up to, and I wanted nothing more than to break his arm, feel the bone crush in my hand, have him on his knees and screaming. I wanted him so afraid he would never come near me again.”

Silence fell once more, only the crackle of the fire surrounding them.

“You’ve had a bad few days,” Kai said at last, and her snort of laughter was soft, regretful.

“That’s no excuse and you know it. I have to find Vega and this time, when I do, she’s dead. No more showboating, no more fucking around. And then I have to leave - for good.”

“We would miss you,” he said. “And what about Dirk? What about Henjo?” He took another sip of his wine. “What about me?” he added quietly, and at last she looked at him. Affection shone in her eyes, and she stretched out a bare foot to poke him with her toes.

“Ah, Kai,” she said with a smile. “We’ve had some times, haven’t we? That damn shine of yours. But when all this is settled and you go home there’s an end of it. Henjo I am worried about, but by the time this is over I’ll have figured out what to do about him. Dirk will be just fine once he gets the hang of it - and as for you, you’ve got a rare old touch for this magic business. You’ll be fine.”

“But--”

“No buts. I’ll put the word out that there is no more link between us and then that’s it. I’ve been manipulated, had the shit kicked out of me - we both have. If it weren’t for me Hanne might still be alive....”

“And Armageddon could have started,” he said firmly. “You said as much yourself. If you hadn’t got the demon out of Dirk--”

“But if I’d followed my initial instinct and just killed him no-one would have been any the wiser,” she said with a sigh. “Point is, Kai, this is bad for both of us. Our worlds are just too damn different. So the decision is made - once this is over it is _over_. And the subject is no longer open for discussion.”

He nodded. Time enough to convince her to change her mind before the end of the tour.

He reached for his goblet, amused to discover that it had been refilled; he suspected he’d have an ally in her room when he made the attempt to persuade her to stick around for a while.

“I’ve sorted us out somewhere to stay near Stockholm,” he said with a firm nod, changing the subject so smoothly Yoz narrowed her eyes at him with suspicion. She was really beginning to regret teaching him how to shield his thoughts from her.

“Oh good,” she replied.

“Two cabins, one large enough to take all fifteen of us but there’s a second one next door - that’ll take six people, so the ‘shifters will have somewhere to change while we all stay secure.”

He sat forward, rolled his goblet between his palms.

“We’ll take the buses - should take us a couple of days to get there - then we’ll leave them at a hotel on the outskirts of the city with the crew. We’ll be taken to the cabins - which will be fully stocked with everything we’ll need--”

“Hope you’ve ordered extra beer,” she said, a wry smile twitching her mouth up in one corner.

“--and we’ll be brought back in time to soundcheck before the gig on the fifteenth, then back on the buses to head for Copenhagen immediately afterwards. Sound like a good plan?”

“Sounds perfect, Mr. Hansen,” she laughed, and they clinked goblets.

But a shadow remained around her eyes.

~*~

The restaurant was filled with sleepy bands and crew when Yoz slouched her way in the following morning. She felt the atmosphere change, a slight tension in the air as she took a seat between Kai and Dirk. 

Dirk pushed a cup of coffee toward her, which she took with a grateful roll of her eyes.

“Do I have to do this?” she asked Kai, under her breath, and Henjo stifled a smile at the plaintive tone of voice.

“Yes you do. You scared them yesterday.”

“Me? Nah. I’m just a pussycat.”

“No, that’s Tobi. Talk to them, Yoz.”

She pushed her chair back with a scrape, and turned to face the room. Expectant faces turned toward her, more than one grin quickly muffled at her obvious discomfort. “Bastards,” she muttered under her breath. Dirk slipped an arm around her waist and gave her a supportive hug. She cradled her coffee, took a deep breath, and began.

“Look, I’m sorry about yesterday. I’m not having an easy time of this lately, what between the worm and Vega and being nailed to a cross and all. Even I get stressed out sometimes, overreact and _Weikath so help me_ if you don’t wipe that smirk off your face we are going to fall out!”

Said self-satisfied smile never left his face as he dropped her a wink. "Anytime you believe you are ready, Magus." 

She tipped her chin up and eyed him, the amusement that creased the skin at the corner of her eyes betraying her attempt to look fierce. “Keep that shit up, scaly, and I’m hiding your heat rock.”

Laughter, but the break in tension made even her sigh, worried tension flowing down her arms and away. Tobi threw a toast crust at the guitarist. “Stop pissing her off!” he hissed, “before she tries to break my other arm!”

“You can relax,” Weiki said to him, then raised his coffee toward the amused Magus in salute. “If there’s any more trouble, I can deal with it.”

Her eyebrows shot up. “You?”

The smug expression had Markus and Andi snorting helplessly. “Yes. After all, when it came down to it, who was the only one of real use in an emergency? Not the rat or the cats....” 

Dani groaned and let his head down on the table with a thump amongst the meows, hisses and other feline noises bantered around the restaurant, to the puzzled amusement of the servers. Yoz arched an eyebrow at Kai.

“You think that settles the appetite for ritual public humiliation that this lot have?”

His laughter was bright. “Not quite, but it’s a good start.”

“Oh God. I’ll be in my bunk,” she groaned, and wandered off to find the bus.

~*~

When Dirk dropped a glass in the kitchen Yoz was at his side in a heartbeat. The tension in the cabin had grown even as the light had faded; she’d warned everyone on their arrival that it wouldn’t happen on the first night but the second, and they’d all spent today acting as though nothing at all was wrong, nothing bad was anticipated, just a normal day.

As the afternoon had worn on the facade had become harder to maintain, and for the last couple of hours silence had reigned, every individual watching and waiting for the show to begin.

Yoz had announced the plan over breakfast, a meal which Dirk had wanted to miss due to extreme nervousness. He’d been advised in no uncertain terms that he was going to need the fuel, and he had therefore better eat well or there would be trouble.

“Once it starts,” she’d begun, consuming bacon sandwiches as though they were going out of fashion, “Tobi, Felix, Dirk and I will head over to the other cabin. I’ve sorted it out in there so it’s suitable,” she added, and poured herself another mug of tea. To their amusement, it appeared that given the chance, their feisty little Magus would cheerfully exist on nothing more than strong tea and bacon sandwiches; she brought their attention back to reality with a bump with her next words.

“You lot,” she continued, and waved her butter knife at them airily, “will lock the doors. You will keep the windows shut and you will not leave this building _for any reason_ until either first light, or one of us comes to the door and says it’s OK.”

“Why not?” asked Sascha, and her grin was humourless.

“Because full moon removes inhibitions,” she replied, “and you would make a fine meal.”

“What about you?”

“I’m different.”

Silence for a moment, then she leaned across the table and pinched his arm. “Don’t worry,” she grinned, “stay indoors and everything will be just fine.”

 _Stay indoors._

That warning echoed loud in the mind of each one of the men remaining behind as Tobi and Yoz half-carried Dirk toward the door. He was doubled over, eyes screwed shut, hands clenched into fists. The three left without so much as a backward glance; Yoz had pottered back and forth all day and made quite a trench in the thigh-deep snow, ensuring that everything was prepared. She had a plan, that much they knew, although exactly what it was she hadn’t thought fit to let anyone know.

Kai made a move to follow them, but Felix was quick to step forward and block him.

“Remember,” he said, “stay here. No matter what you see, or hear. It’s really important.”

A warm body at his shoulder, and Kai turned to see Eggi. He edged past, began to reach out to Felix then let his hand drop. 

“See you in the morning,” said the ‘shifter with a smile for his friend, then left.

Eggi locked the door behind him, then stood with his hand on the frame for a moment. “Good luck,” he muttered, but so softly that no-one but Kai heard him.

“Now what?” called Sascha, from the kitchen doorway. Kai caught Eggi’s eye, then turned to Sascha with a shrug.

“We wait,” he said, and went to fetch himself a beer.

~*~

Dirk trembled, and Yoz cradled him in her arms.

“Hurts,” he moaned, and she clenched her teeth. He’d only seen the more experienced ‘shifters change, and it was coming as a shock to him that the transformation was so painful.

Tobi came forward on his knees, his eyes soft with understanding. “It gets easier. The first one is the worst.”

“The plan is this,” she said, speaking quickly to Tobi, hoping he would catch the urgency in her voice, “once the change is almost complete, I’ll shift too.”

“You can do that?”

“Yeah. I try not to unless I have to - hurts like a sonofabitch every time unless you’ve got the genes for it - but yeah, I can.”

Dirk moaned again, and arched his spine; sweat ran down his sides and dripped to the floor, and his head whipped from side to side as he fought the transformation that held his body in its savage grip.

“Here it comes,” said Tobi, and Yoz took a firmer hold of the body in her arms.

Over the wails of the terrified, hurting man she held close to her chest she barely noticed Tobi stand back and flow into his other form; he sat on his haunches and blinked big green eyes at the pair, waited for the storm to pass. Dirk’s hands twisted, the fingers bent back then folded into the hooks that would become paws; his face creaked, the skull lengthened, ears moved from the sides to the top of his head, altered shape and grew silver grey fur as they did so.

He curled into the Magus’ lap, longer hair bristling along his spine, the wails of agony burnt away to whimpers of pain every time another piece of his body would change shape with a jerk, or another element of the transformation reached its zenith. Blood dripped from his mouth, the changed anatomy of his teeth slicing through the tender flesh of his gums as he tried to close his long jaws.

She carefully laid him on the floor, and gave Tobi a quick nod. “Look after him,” she said, and rose to gather what she would need for the transforming magic. Tobi moved closer to the twitching almost-wolf on the floor, crouched by his head and purred; Dirk seemed to feel the warmth of his presence, and the terror retreated a little.

On the other side of the room, close to where the furniture had been piled up to free up the maximum floor space, Yoz began to set the spell in motion. She drew the circle, focused her energies, wove together the blend of the physical and the ethereal that she needed to achieve her end. She stripped, tossed clothes hurriedly on the jumbled pile of furniture, then stepped into the circle; she knelt, and with a long sigh released the forces on a whispered syllable that would set the magic in motion.

It began immediately, the pain throwing her down on her side with a curse spat through bared teeth. This was hard; she was forcing herself into a physical change that she was not designed to endure, and although objectively the shift would only take a few moments, subjectively it took hours.

Fast and brutal the magic surged through her body, rewriting her form wherever it went. Tobi sat up, and pricked his ears; the creaks and crunches coming from the body that writhed inside the glow of the circle sounded painful, and the choked moans appeared to back that up. Then she stilled, the grinding reduced to mere shivers that trembled through the gleaming, thick coat, and the wolf lay on its side for a moment. Her flanks heaved as she got her breath back, then she rolled to her chest and wobbled her head round to look at the great cat.

 _Motherfuck, every time I do this I swear I’ll never do it again_ she said to him, her voice transferring directly between their minds.

That was the other major difference between her and the ‘natural’ shapeshifter species; she retained an essentially human mind, able to think and speak in words. They, when wearing the form of their Beast, did not; rather, they thought in emotions and pictures, swapped between them by a process half telepathy, half empathy.

He growled in agreement, watched her haul herself to her feet. She gave her coat a shake, and started toward them; by the time she’d crossed the room she was steady on her paws, and moved as though she’d been doing this for years.

Tobi knew that Dirk wasn’t going to find it nearly as easy. 

_Come on mate,_ she said into Dirk’s mind, nuzzling him on the side of the face, _time to get up._

A whimper was the only response she got, and Tobi joined her beside the shivering wolf. She licked Dirk’s face, the cat purred in his ear but it looked as though he was determined to stay curled up in a heap for the rest of the night. Yoz dropped to sit on her haunches, laid her ears flat and growled at him.

_Dirk. Get up. The longer you leave it the harder it is._

He did look at her, his whine more pathetic than ever as he scrabbled his paws on the floor. Although his mind knew how to move he fought it, convinced that he should be using the normal human way of moving to stand up. And with four legs, a tail and a spine designed to be used horizontally not vertically, he wasn’t having much luck.

The trick, which Yoz realised that Tobi knew as well as she did when she saw him rise and position himself behind Dirk, was to startle the conscious mind out of trying to change what the subconscious mind was trying to do. And the best way to do that was through a short, sharp shock - like having five razor sharp claws dug into one’s rump, which sent Dirk to all four paws with a yelp that sounded more like a shriek.

He whirled round and snarled, snapped impressive fangs at the smug cat; he just leaned back, and before the surprise could catch up with Dirk Yoz joined him, rubbed herself along his body and licked at his muzzle. He grumbled in his throat, but relaxed a little; his new senses clamoured for attention, and for the first time he realised just how poor the human sense of smell, hearing, touch and sight were. Overwhelmed, he let himself fall into the experience; he sniffed at Yoz and Tobi’s changed forms, ears never still as he picked up everything from the snick of her nails on the wooden floor to the tunnelling of bugs in the beams above their heads.

Once he was more in control of himself - and had managed a lap or two of the room without falling over - Yoz made her way to the door of the cabin, reared up on her hind legs and manipulated the handle with her paws, grumbling under her breath the whole time, much to Tobi’s feline amusement. Getting it open she paused in the opening, and looked back over her shoulder at the two changed creatures behind her.

 _Want to see how a run feels?_ she asked Dirk, and trotted out onto the deck. He followed at a much slower pace, Tobi keeping station at his shoulder.

He paused once outside, natural caution making itself felt through his system. Tobi purred; it was good to see, and meant that at least he had something of a chance of survival - in their world, caution was everything.

His muzzle lifted to the horizon, and he took in the smells and the sounds of the crisp winter night. 

Always before when he’d been out somewhere like this he’d been struck by how lifeless it was. Now, though, he could appreciate how wrong he’d been; the night thrummed with life, albeit muted with the cold. Mice and other such tiny animals ( _prey!_ cried his mind) scuffled under the snow, and owls fluffed their plumage and waited in the trees. Deer moved further back, and he caught a brief whiff of bear; human smells were everywhere, and he knew that if he caught one he was fast and strong enough to run them down, tear their flesh and drink their blood--

 _Enough of that,_ chided a voice in his mind gently. _Let’s get you running first. Come on...._

He walked down the steps, taking them one at a time; Yoz had trotted down them easily, and once he’d made a rather undignified leap into the snow at the bottom Tobi curled his back and bounded lightly over his head, all four paws hitting the snow together in front of him then crouching to lash his tail, amusement gleaming in the bright green eyes. 

A disturbance from above, a shower of packed snow and Felix joined them, the jump down from the roof easy for him. He made his way to Tobi and rubbed his body along him, a low rumble from his chest accompanying the gentle bites at his friend’s neck and jaw. Dominance satisfied he turned to Yoz and repeated the process, getting a snap when he went a little too close to her hindquarters; Dirk snarled at him as well, which brought the sensation of laughter from Tobi, and a dirty look from where Felix sat in the snow.

The new wolf advanced on him, hackles up and head swung low in threat; Felix, unwilling to back down to the newest member of their peculiar gathering, arched his back and snarled. Despite the fact that the wolf weighed almost double what he did, the damage he could inflict in a scuffle was tremendous. Yoz pushed herself in front of Dirk, and Tobi pounced on Felix’ back; in moments the cats were rolling in the snow, a rough wrestling game with much hissing and yowling in progress, and Dirk had curled his haunches under him to watch, ears pricked.

 _Now there’s an idea,_ mused Yoz, and turned her mismatched gaze on Dirk. _Come on, chase me._

He looked at her, scarlet tongue lolling from his long jaws. Query? came the impression from his mind.

She growled again, rubbed herself along under his chin and paused to smack his muzzle with her tail; he rumbled in reply, the scent of her filling his nostrils and drawing him along to stand beside her, nuzzling at the thick ruff of silver fur around her neck. She was his, to dominate and hunt beside, to curl up with after the hunt; some emotion moved deep in his chest and he growled again--

And just like that she was gone; confused, he looked for her only to see her a few leaps away from him, front paws stretched out on the ground and haunches raised, tail waving as she stared at him. Heat rushed through his body, and amusement coloured his mind; this was as good a way as any to learn how his new body worked, and if he did manage to catch the she-wolf teasing him from just out of reach? Well then, maybe he’d learn how other parts of the new body worked, too.

Dirk gave a small yip, and charged through the snow after the other wolf.

__

~~tbc~~


	19. Eighteen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She leaned closer to the pale faced guitarist, and her smirk was wicked. "Nothing too big, nothing fancy—I just need a wee slice of your soul."

_****_

Chapter Eighteen

Andi leaned on the window frame, and stared out at the night.

They’d all heard some of the noises coming from the other cabin, and been grateful that they were locked securely in this one; even Dani, now hiding in one of the upstairs rooms, had muttered that he would rather be in here with Weiki than out there with _them_.

Mike had tried to look hurt, but eventually had to give in and shoot the drummer a sly grin, hissing a little under his breath.

Andi shook his head at the memory of how quickly Dani had shot up the stairs at that point. His cigar almost finished he was about to turn away from the window - and his musing - when movement from the other cabin caught his eye. He leaned closer to the window, craned his neck to see; then he turned to see who else was in the room, because if nobody else saw it then they certainly wouldn’t believe him when he told them later.

“Kai.”

Hearing his name he rolled his head to one side, blinked sleepily. Andi beckoned, a grin threatening to split his face open; curious, Kai hauled himself out of the deep embrace of the sofa and wandered, barefoot, across to join him at the window.

“Wha- oh. My. God. Is that who I think it is?”

Andi shrugged. “Can’t think who else it would be, can you?”

“Good point.”

The wolves chased each other through the snow, crystals flying from beneath their paws and catching the moonlight in a blue-white sparkle of effort, their breath huffing out around them as they played. Dirk must be the bigger animal, they assumed; he was still somewhat clumsier than the small bitch wolf that spun around him, but he was catching up. 

Out of nowhere they were joined by the two cats, their feline forms swifter on the turns, arching and jumping over the backs of the wolves as all four of the beasts romped in the fresh white powder. Tobi, his black coat standing out most against the snow, was rolled over by the smaller wolf; she grabbed at his throat, nipped at his underbelly and let him swat at the sides of her head and roll her over in return. Growls and yips came through the frost laced glass, and Kai called Eero and Dan across to witness the spectacle.

“What are they doing?” asked Eero, frowning as Felix wrapped his paws around the larger wolf’s neck and tried to wrestle him into a snowdrift.

“I think,” said Kai, and his huff of amusement fogged the glass, “they’re playing.”

~*~

All four laid in the snow, breathing great clouds of mist as they got their breath back. Felix eyed Tobi, then the woods. Yoz rose, and shook the clinging snow from her coat.

_Sure. You guys hunt that way, right?_

The cats sent agreement, came in to rub themselves against her before heading off with determined leaps toward the woods. Yoz turned to the larger wolf, and licked his face. _Come with me. Time you learned to hunt_ , she said into his mind, and dropped her jaw into a huge grin when he jumped to all fours, almost trembling with enthusiasm.

She led the way, the pair moving in single file toward the woods; they were taking a different route to the cats, etiquette demanding that whenever possible the different species should hunt apart. Dirk was occupied with processing all the information pouring into his mind via his enhanced senses; once they were under the thick cover of the trees he slowed, ears flicking back and forth to collect every nuance of sound. Yoz halted a little ahead, waited for him.

 _It is different, isn’t it?_ she said to him, and his agreement was wordless and wondering.

They spent some time hunting mice through the briars, she flushing them for him to pounce on; when he finally co-ordinated feet and jaws and jump sufficiently to actually catch one he’d eaten it before he’d even thought about it. At his mental yelp of disgust she emerged from the bramble bush she’d been working through to discover him sitting on his haunches, trying to stare down his own nose.

!Horror! Small furry thing/eating - !Disgust!

_Look, you were supposed to eat it. Don’t worry about it._

His stare was mournful enough that she stifled her amusement and sat next to him, pushed her face into his fur and nuzzled him. _Tell you what, we’ll try rabbits next._

Still getting over eating the mouse, he followed her deeper into the woods.

~*~

Weiki crept up the stairs, searching out the source of the muffled whimpers he could hear coming from one of the smaller bedrooms. It had to be Dani; most of the others were down either in the kitchen or the common room, talking, smoking, doing whatever was necessary to ignore the events that had begun in the small cabin next door.

But for Dani there was no ignoring it. The full moon called to his blood, demanded that he give in and change, be true to his Beast; but to indulge it would terrify the people he called friends, and he dared not join the other ‘shifters in their celebration of the winter night.

He didn’t bother to knock, just eased the door open and leaned on the frame, long form silhouetted against the warm light of the landing.

“Dani?”

“Go away, Weikath,” snapped a thin voice from the darkness.

He shrugged, lit himself a fresh cigarette; he’d expected this. “Why didn’t you go out with the others?” he asked, keeping his voice pitched low so as not to alarm. Rats could be _fast_ , and the last thing he wanted to do was irritate the man enough for him to set his Beast on him. 

The bed creaked as Dani uncurled his body. “Are you serious? Two wolves and two cats? I’d be killed.”

Weiki entered the room, allowed the door to drop quietly shut behind him. Now that his eyes were getting used to the gloom he didn’t need the lamp; the reflected moonlight from the snow outside was sufficient to show him details of the room. Had he been in his own Beast form he could have mapped the room by the heat signatures of everything within it; not only did his own Beast have marvellous eyesight, but being able to see in infra-red was also handy, at times. 

However.

Despite the fact that having let it out once it wanted out again he pushed the thoughts to the back of his head, and sat down at the small desk tucked in the corner of the room. Dani turned to face him, wrinkled his nose at the sharp smell of the cigarette.

“You’ve hunted with them before,” said Weiki calmly.

The sigh was deep, and sad. “Yeah, but that was in a city. And it wasn’t full moon. And they weren’t teaching a new Beast what he’s capable of.”

“That makes a difference?” asked Weiki, a little surprised. As he was not governed by the moon, it made no difference to him what time of the month it was.

This time Dani’s snort carried more than a touch of derision. “Yeah Weiki, it makes a difference. It’s harder to think on a full moon - you’re so totally your Beast that the human is...” and now he groaned, “a very long way away. And dammit, it _hurts_.”

A noise from the snow outside had both men at the window, peering down at the moonlit vista revealed from the small, frosted pane of glass. The wolves were charging around in the snow, rolling each other over, playing like dogs on a beach; soon the cats joined them, and it became a joyful free-for-all under the stars. Dani hissed something between his teeth, curled up on the bed and buried his face in his hands.

Weiki sat beside him, watched his trembling form for a moment. 

“If it hurts so much,” he said, his voice soft, “why not change?”

One bright black eye regarded him incredulously from the curled up heap. “Are you insane, Weikath? What would everyone down there do? They’d panic, run - and if they go out there with that lot all fired up, someone’s going to get hurt.”

“No-one is going to panic,” shrugged Weiki, “they all know what you are. And it would stop it hurting, wouldn’t it?”

Dani uncurled a little more. “Well... yes. But what about you?”

“What about me?”

He sat up, wrapped his arms around his knees, and stared at his friend with eyes changed to the all-black of his Beast. “Won’t your Beast want to,” and he swallowed hard, remembering the enormous snake that had so shocked them all, “hunt?”

Weiki barked one of his odd, truncated laughs. Once he got himself back under control, he shook his head. “Dani, there was only one time I thought about eating you, and I decided it wasn’t worth the indigestion. Besides,” he added with a wicked grin, “it’s too damn cold here. I don’t think I could change even if I wanted to. And I don’t.”

Dani thought about this for a moment, then shrugged.

“Let me think about it. I see what you mean, but I don’t know,” he shrugged, stared out of the window and winced, the moonlight catching his face, “I just don’t know if I can.”

Weiki rose, headed for the door. “Then think about it. But you don’t have to sit up here hurting, OK?”

He slipped out, leaving his friend biting his nails, lost in thought.

~*~

Andi had fallen asleep, he and Kai curled against Markus’ somnolent form on the sofa, a trio of snores shaking the rafters. Henjo had folded his long form into one armchair, and Weiki had the other; Dan and Eero had retired to bed, and the kitchen was filled with the laughter of Eggi, Dirk, Sascha and Jens as they worked their way through the stock of beer. Only Weiki heard the faint catch of claws on the wooden floor, and glanced up to see a twitch of dark whiskers through the banisters.

He smiled down at his book, and ignored the sleek grey form when it made its - cautious - way down the stairs, hesitating at the bottom. Dani lifted his muzzle, scented the air, and ground his teeth together nervously.

“I think there’ll be some beer left if you hurry,” murmured Henjo, turning the page of his book with total unconcern for the huge rat not four feet from his chair.

Weiki had to stifle a snort when Dani reared up on his hind legs in surprise, then covered his reaction by dropping back to all fours and having a good scratch, the process necessitating him swinging his muzzle to look away from the humans. Sascha, alerted by Henjo’s words, leaned back on his chair and stuck his head round the kitchen door.

“Ah, Dani!”

The rat stared at the man with some suspicion.

“I was just telling Eggi that rat’s tails aren’t completely bald. Come in here and prove me right.”

Henjo looked over the top of his book. “For god’s sake get in there. They’ve been arguing about it for the past half hour, and none of them had the balls to actually go and ask you. So please, before we have to get Weiki to go in there and bite the lot of them.”

Sascha grinned. “That would kill us without him turning into a snake,” he said, ducking back round the doorframe at the murderous glare shot in his direction.

Dani thought about it for a moment, then unfolded into his halfway form. With a shrug to Weiki he joined the others in the kitchen, no more than a couple of startled yelps marking his arrival. The conversation in there soon settled down to a steady hum, punctuated by occasional barks of laughter; Andi cracked open an eye, nudged Henjo’s foot with his toe.

“He’s OK now?” he asked quietly. Henjo leaned his head over the back of the armchair, and chuckled. He’d caught a glimpse of four young human males and a were-rat talking and drinking beer together as though it was the most natural thing in the world. He shot a thumbs-up to Andi, and settled back to reading his book.

“Good,” muttered Andi to himself, snuggled deeper into Markus’ chest, and went back to sleep.

~*~

Dawn was lightening the sky by the time they returned, discovering Tobi and Felix curled up asleep on one of the upstairs beds. The fire was still alight in the main common room, and Dirk settled next to it, watching the smaller wolf that laid down by his side. He knew that she would be changing back as soon as the sun crossed the horizon; they’d barely made it back in time, distracted as they’d been by each other and the hunt.

She sighed, rested her head on her paws and looked into the glowing embers; he laid his muzzle across her back, and echoed her with a rumble. It hadn’t been as bad as he’d feared; once he’d got over his very human disgust at eating the whole carcase of a dead rabbit, he’d settled to it like a natural. And this way, the darkness that lurked under his soul - the darkness that the demon had found and exploited - was bound to the wolf and controlled by it. As though it was meant to be, and the thought comforted him as he let himself relax in front of the warmth of the fire, the feeling of the she-wolf beside him only adding to his contentment.

It didn’t last; she moved away from him and gave him a last lick on the muzzle before curling up on herself, whimpers of pain driven from her as the magic curled through her body, taking back the transformation it had performed the night before. He winced to hear the crack of bone and the grind of cartilage, meaty noises, tearing sounds, the wetness of internal organs rearranging themselves. A long whine of pain became words ground out through gritted - but very human - teeth, and soon she was curled into a foetal position, shuddering and coated in a sheen of cold sweat.

“Christ that hurts,” she whispered, eyes still screwed shut; he nuzzled her face, licked her cheek; she snorted with laughter, pushed his long nose away from her. He whined, pushed his face against her again; she cracked open her eyes, and smiled. “You know,” she murmured, her fingers finding their way to bury themselves in the softness of his ruff, “your eyes are beautiful whatever form you’re in, you know?”

He huffed at her, and she used him to lever herself upright. They leaned against each other for a moment, he regretting the loss of the bond they had shared whilst she was also wearing the shape of a wolf, and she just wondering how the hell she was going to crawl upstairs to bed while all her muscles felt about as useful as wet dishrags. An idea occurred to her, and she nudged the great wolf that sat beside her. He canted his head, focused piercing dark-amber eyes on her.

“Try shifting to your halfway form,” she said, and he cocked his head the other way as he thought about it.

?Confusion?

“I know you don’t know how. Just... look inside and try.”

He thought hard for a moment, and tried it; sure enough, in the dark places he’d been afraid to look at for so very long there it was, just waiting for him to try. The flow of bone and muscle this time was uncomfortable, but nowhere even close to the agony he’d felt for his first shift the night before. Yoz tilted her head back, admired the enormous werewolf crouched next to her.

“There, see? Knew you could do it. Now if you could just give me a hand here--”

He didn’t bother, just scooped her up in his arms. She, amused at his show of masculine strength, scratched him under the chin and snorted at his rumble of appreciation.

“Come on,” she said, “I need some sleep. To the bedroom!”

Cradling her close to his chest he carried her up the stairs, unsurprised to find that she’d fallen asleep before he even reached the room they’d decided to use. Carefully putting her down on the bed he pulled the quilt around her, running savagely taloned fingers through her mess of black hair. She mumbled, curled around her pillow; he settled down on the foot of the bed, and faced the door.

He’d watch over her while she slept, today, tomorrow, and for as long as she wanted him to.

Senses still on full alert, he let himself doze as the sun climbed higher in the sky and the snow began to melt.

~*~

The scent of bacon woke her, and she cracked her eyes open to spy a plate of her favourite sandwiches being wafted back and forth under her nose, a mug of tea steaming merrily on the side table. 

“You’re a star,” she mumbled, “what are you?”

Dirk sat himself on the end of the bed and crossed his legs, picked at a thread on his jeans while Yoz made short work of the meal he’d brought. Once she’d finished and was leaned back against the padded headboard, cigarette in one hand and tea in the other, he caught her eye with a smile.

“They were OK with me when I went across,” he said, and his tone was wondering. She snorted.

“Well, what did you expect?”

He looked down at his bare feet. “Fear,” he said quietly. “Maybe uncertainty,” he added, tilting his head to eye her, his hair sliding across one shoulder when he gave her one of his rare, shy smiles. “But it was fine.”

Tea finished, she stubbed out her cigarette and settled the mug out of the way before she beckoned him forward. They curled together on the bed, the soft white winter light gleaming on their twined bodies.

“Told you so,” she chuckled, and he nuzzled under her chin, nipped at her throat.

She gave him a tight hug, then wriggled around until she could look him in the eye.

“Lover, I’ve got something to tell you.”

He frowned, tried to push away from her but she held him tight; once he settled again - although not allowing the frown to drop - she sighed and pushed on.

“I don’t know if Kai’s told you this, but once this tour is done and you guys are away home, well, I’m leaving.”

He shrugged, his expression shaded to uncertainty. “You always leave,” he said, “but you’ll be back.”

Her fingers were warm where they caressed his stubble-rough cheek. He hadn’t even taken the time to shave before he brought her food up, and a quick flash of pain in her heart got stamped on with alacrity.

“Not this time,” she told him, and he sat up, eyes wide with shock.

“You’re leaving for good?” 

Yoz shrugged. “I have to.”

Dirk sat next to her, looked down at her solemn face. “No, you don’t. You could stay.”

She sighed, shook her head.

“With me.”

That got her attention. She looked up at him, her expression sharp until she read his eyes.

“No--”

“There’s nobody in charge of the magic in Hamburg,” he pressed on, “you could be the one to take it over.”

Her groan came up from deep inside. “No, Dirk. For one, I need to go back to England. And for two, I can no more stay in one place than I can fly. You want to trap me in one city? And besides,” she added, one finger trailed across his face, along his neck, “what about when you tour? I get to stay in the city and wait for you to come home? No.”

“But--”

“And why not just hang a sign round your neck - ‘to control my Magus, do something painful to me’.”

He closed his mouth, then another idea occurred to him. As soon as she picked this one up she scrambled upright in the bed, drew her knees up between them.

“And don’t even--”

He touched her knee, flexed his fingers. “If I bit you, you would have to stay,” he mused, almost to himself. “You would be bound to me then, wouldn’t you? You would be a wolf. Like me.”

She was off the bed and by the window in a flash, her expression wary. “OK, stop right there,” she snapped. “Quite apart from the fact that getting bitten by you would hurt like fuck, it wouldn’t work anyway.”

Flesh flowed, and the werewolf that backed her into the corner had a dreadful eagerness in his amber eyes. “Why not?” he growled, and drew his lips back from formidable teeth. 

“Christ, enough. Look,” she said, slumped against the wall, wrung one hand over her eyes. She’d hoped never to have this conversation - with anyone, never mind him. “It won’t work because it can’t.”

“Can’t?”

“Are you a wolf or a parrot? No, it can’t. Because. Because, because, because.”

The snarl began as a rumble deep in his chest and he took one step forward, the growl rising in volume.

“Because I’m not human enough for it to take over my system,” she told him with a sigh, and watched the shock register in eyes that flowed from the wolf’s amber into all too human grey. 

“ _What?_ ”

The bed creaked as she settled back on to it, laced her fingers behind her head and studied the ceiling. He perched next to her, confusion around him like a cloud.

“I’ve changed so much of myself over the years,” she said, “locked so much magic into my flesh, travelled Outside the universe so many times that the human has been burned out in me. There’s still some left, but not enough for what you’re thinking.”

Dirk shook his head. “How is that possible?”

Her smile was sad. “It’s magic,” she said, and he felt his heart sink.

~*~

That night Dirk hunted with Tobi and Felix. Yoz spent her time closed up in her room searching for the rogue sorceress; the others had felt the tension that emanated from them both, but none of them - even Weiki - were quite brave enough to ask. Henjo wanted to go and visit her room, and got into quite a row with Kai over it; at first light - once the danger of the hunting ‘shifters was past - he headed over to the smaller cabin, and pounded on the door of the room she’d chosen to unfold her private universe in.

Instead of the fight to be admitted that he’d anticipated, however, the door was answered before he even had to start shouting.

“Henjo,” she said with a smile, and let him in.

She flopped back onto the sofa, picked her book back up and let him roam, touch the walls and mutter under his breath for the pleasure of renewing his acquaintance with the impossible entity. The fire crackled and talked to itself in the hearth, and the Magus listened in with half an ear to Henjo’s conversation with the soul of her room while she pretended to study the treatise on experimental alchemy open in her lap. She’d been doing some research into his problem - and the solutions she’d come up with she was pretty sure he wasn’t going to like.

Once finished he found his way to the sofa, lit himself a cigarette. She put her book aside, took his chin in gentle fingers and tilted his head up. He returned her steady gaze, unafraid, not even getting his usual shy urge to drop the stare when she frowned at him.

She let him go, pinched one of his smokes, and sighed. “It’s changed you, Henjo,” she told him quietly.

He shrugged.

“I suppose it has,” he replied, his words no louder than hers.

“No, I don’t think you understand,” she said, and the tang of sorrow in her voice had him fidgeting with unease. “You’re being lost. Every time you do it, there’s a little less Henjo and a little more stone....”

His smoked-out cigarette end bounced amongst the glow of the logs, settled to melt away to nothing between the flames. Henjo’s hands rasped against his arms, and Yoz fought down a smile; whenever he was nervous, off he’d go. Some people wrung their fingers, some fidgeted - Henjo rubbed.

“So that’s what it meant,” he muttered, and Yoz looked up sharply.

“What who meant?”

He explained about the soul of the city, and the quiet conversation he’d had when the frenzy of his contact with the stones had overwhelmed him. He’d almost lost his mind, and he shuddered for the remembrance of it.

Now she really couldn’t sit still, and jumped from the sofa to pace. She spoke her thoughts aloud over the ring of her boot heels, and Henjo got the distinct impression that her words were as much for the benefit of their surroundings as for him.

“If you keep doing this it’s going to wear you away until you’re nothing more than a walking rock. The buildings - the souls of the stones - are desperate for contact. What must it be like, to be created and assembled by a species, to be part of their lives and their triumphs and tragedies and never be able to share it with them? To be as sentient as the creatures within you, but forever divided from them.” She shook her head. “No wonder they jump on you so damn fast,” she said with a sigh, “they’re as addicted to you as you are to them.”

Henjo sat forward, rested his elbows on his knees and stared into the fire. “It’s not loneliness,” he mused, “well. Sometimes, but mostly not. They have each other, but they’re so excited to be able to communicate - no, not excited, that’s the wrong word. Relieved? Yeah. That’s it.”

“No-one wants to go into the dark unremembered,” she said softly.

“And although their memories join with the earth when they’re destroyed, that sense of self vanishes,” he agreed.

They looked at each other, and she pursed her lips.

“You’re not going to like it,” she said, “but I can only see one way out of this.”

He lit another cigarette, and kept his head down. She came and sat next to him, patted his knee and ducked her head to catch his eye.

“Henjo,” she said, “it’s killing you.”

“I know,” he mumbled. “But--”

“But nothing. Keep this up and you’re going to die - maybe not physically, but your mind? Everything that makes you, you - all that’s going to wear away to nothing. And that would be bad.”

The expression he turned up to her was about as miserable as anything she’d ever seen. “I know. But is what you’re going to do any better?”

She put her arms around him, and he clung to her. “Probably not,” she sighed, and rocked him through his grief.

~*~

The slam of the door was not a good sign, and several heads popped up above the back of the sofa to regard her with a certain amount of wariness. Yoz ignored them, stomped through to the kitchen, put the kettle on and hopped up onto the counter, eyeing the snow moodily through the window and ignoring everyone.

“Dare I ask?” said Andi from where he lounged against the doorframe, cigarette between his teeth and eyebrow arched delicately.

She gave a snort, jumped down from the counter and fussed about making her tea before reassuming her place on the side. “Probably not, no.”

He came in, shut the door - incidentally blocking the querying stares of the others - and sat down at the table. He tapped the worn grain of the surface, cocked an eye at her.

“Come on,” he said, “sit. Talk to me.”

Reluctance in every line she did so, taking the offered cigarette but not meeting his eye even when he lit it for her.

“So what’s up now?” he asked. “Dirk and the others blew out of here as soon as it was dark, and they haven’t been back. Kai’s fretting, Henjo’s all pissy with him and we’re stuck in the middle. Now, before you try and break anybody else’s arms don’t you think you should get whatever it is off your chest?”

Her laugh was more of a bark than a true sound of good cheer. “You’re not as dumb as you look, are you?”

Andi winked, and she took a long slug of tea before she began to explain. She told him about Dirk, and what he’d wanted to do, his vision of urban wolf-pack bliss; Kai’s sense of abandonment, no matter how hard she explained that it was time for her to go. Andi took it all in, watched the expressions flick across her face when she told him about Henjo, and the consequences of his addiction to the peculiar telepathic contact he could achieve with any building of stone. Or brick or wood, come to that; it just had to be old enough.

“So what are you going to do?” he asked, and she flung herself against the backrest of the chair with a groan.

“The only I thing I _can_ do,” she said, and tipped her head forward to meet Andi’s impossibly bright blue gaze. “I’m going to stop him from being able to do it.”

“Permanently?”

“Permanently.”

“He isn’t going to like that. Not even a shred of it left?”

She shrugged. “He doesn’t have to like it. And he’ll still have a sense of empathy; he’ll have a good sense of the history of a place without being able to speak to it, and he’ll always retain an ability to get a feel for a building. Whether good things have happened or bad, for instance. But to actually communicate? No. That’ll be gone - well, blocked.”

The other man considered this, then lit himself a fresh cigarette, used it to cover his thoughts for a second. “Can it be unblocked? What you can lock someone can unlock, I would have thought.”

“Not without destroying his mind,” she said, and Andi patted her hand. She looked as miserable about the situation as he was sure Henjo felt.

“He’ll only be able to do what other people can do,” mused Andi, his eyes never leaving the Magus’ downcast face.

“Yeah. Which, to him, will feel like nothing - even though it isn’t. I’m going to blind him, make him deaf. I’m going to destroy one of the things that makes him special.”

Silence fell for a few moments, and Andi’s next words were soft.

“When are you going to do it?”

“No time like the present, I thought,” she told him. “He asked if I shouldn’t wait until I’d caught Vega, but if I put it off this time then what about next time? Do we keep coming up with excuse after excuse until his mind breaks down, and then how the fuck do I look Kai in the eye? ‘Sorry squire,’ I’ll say, ‘could have stopped this happening but decided not to. Have fun finding a new best mate.’”

She thumped her head on the table. “I hate this,” came the mumble, “I absolutely fucking _hate_ it.”

“He believes you, doesn’t he?” asked Andi. “He knows what’ll happen if you don’t do it?”

“Sure,” and she folded her arms on the table, slouched to rest her chin on them. “That’s why he’s agreed to let me do it. This sort of magic is always easier when the recipient is willing.” 

“It’s not done already, surely,” he asked, eyebrows arched with surprise.

Yoz shook her head, and Andi was startled to see tears glimmering on her lashes. “No,” she said. “Because my room begged me to give it a chance to say goodbye. It’s never asked me for anything before.”

And with that, she buried her face in her arms, and burst into tears.

~*~

By the time she returned to the room you would never have known she’d been upset, let alone bawled her eyes out on Andi’s shoulder for half an hour. She’d extracted a promise from him that he wouldn’t tell anyone about it - that she didn’t expect him to keep, not really - dried her eyes and headed back to see if Henjo and her room had finished their own session of crying on each other’s shoulders.

Metaphorically speaking, of course.

Henjo had stretched out on the sofa, feet dangling over the end of it, and stared at the ceiling while filling the ashtray balanced on his chest, one cigarette butt at a time. The atmosphere was heavy with sorrow, and his eyes were red.

“We don’t have to do this here,” she said, and folded her arms on the back of the sofa to lean across and stare into his face.

He lifted one shoulder in a shrug, then flicked his eyes up to regard her gravely. “Might as well,” he said. “I’ve got to get used to it - the blankness, I mean.”

“Henjo--”

He swung himself around, rubbed one hand across his eyes. “Sorry. Look, let’s get this over with.”

Cool fingers touched his forehead, and he braced himself for whatever was going to happen next - then the contact ceased, and her voice penetrated the fog of misery that enfolded man and grieving building.

“Fuck. I can’t do this. I know!” she roared, and Henjo knew she wasn’t talking to him. “I agree! But we need to figure something out or he’s going to end up with a head filled with mush, and dead he can’t talk to anyone.” She turned back to stare at him, eyes narrowed. “Come on,” she said, “there’s enough bloody books in here. Let’s see if we can find something useful in them.”

~*~

In the end she dragged Andi and Kai in to help; Kai because his talent might be useful and Andi because - well, just because. His calm good humour had become important to all of them, even Yoz; she’d been surprised at just how much she’d come to trust him, and vowed that he was another one she’d have to keep a healthy distance from.

Once this was over, of course.

Her room was flexing its sentience as never before; books nudged out of the shelves, small side tables complete with reading lamps popped out of nowhere, as did comfy armchairs that invited one to sit and read awhile. It had been a little taken aback when she dragged Andi through the door, although it had greeted Kai with a warm burst of affection and another goblet of wine.

Andi, of course, had charmed it in about ten seconds flat by patting the nearest piece of stonework and telling everyone that he’d never seen anything quite so beautiful, and he could see why Yoz was so proud of it.

Through the thick fog of cigarette and cigar smoke all that could be heard was mutters and grumbles, fragments of sentences read aloud and ‘what’s this?’ and ‘maybe this--’ and ‘crap, there’s gotta be something--’ wending their way through the frustrated air. More books were selected and discarded, the ones in strange languages piled up for Yoz to peruse and the others stumbling through what they could.

“What are we actually looking for?” asked Andi eventually, a heavy tome on tonal incantations for banishing spirits open on his lap, “exactly?” 

Kai, seated on the floor with one hand tangled in his hair and the other holding a book steady on his knees, glared at him.

“Anything on - I don’t know, anything that looks useful!”

The snap of the book being slapped shut made everyone jump, and Andi went to return it to the shelf with a muttered curse. “Anything that might be useful, he says,” he said to himself, then cocked an eye at the ceiling. “Come on beautiful, you must know what you’ve got here. Help us out, would you?”

The very air seemed to shiver, then a more modern book - little more than a pamphlet - nudged against his knee from a lower shelf. With a wink at the empty air he retrieved it, and read the title on the cover.

“’Physical Manifestations Of Telepathic Triggers’”, he said aloud, and nodded. “Sounds promising.”

He settled back into his chair to read, but his shout a moment later brought everyone running. He’d found what they needed - although there was, as ever, a problem.

~*~

Another council of war, fifteen men and one Magus clustered in the large lounge of the bigger cabin.

“The blood I can deal with,” said Yoz, from her post leaned against the side of the fireplace, “and I’ve got most of the spell ingredients in stock. But there’s one or two I need a little help with.”

“Such as?” asked Eero, wide eyed from under Dan’s arm.

“Nothing you can provide, sweetheart,” she said with a wink, “so you can stop panicking.”

“What will this spell actually do?” asked Weiki, icy blue eyes narrowed with suspicion. He didn’t like the way Andi fidgeted, or Henjo and Kai were avoiding looking at anyone. It worried him.

She spread her hands and looked innocent. “It will allow Henjo to make contact with the souls, but will prevent that contact from becoming as profound as it has been. It’ll be like talking to someone through a wire fence, and if either one of them tries to cut that wire then the contact will break. It should mean they can give each other what they need, but without reducing him to a vegetable. Which would be bad.”

Murmurs of agreement whispered around the room, and she exchanged a quick glance with Kai before she continued.

“Thing is, I need a few bits and pieces from some of you - and they have to be given freely, or they’re useless.”

“Go on,” said Felix, his tone now as wary as Weiki’s expression.

“I need a bone from a shapeshifter,” she said, then hurried to add: “but it only needs to be a really small one, from the end of a tail or a toe--”

Henjo hid his face in his hands at the shouts. He’d expected this, and it was only going to get worse.

“And Weiki?”

“Oh no--”

“Just a scale. A really small one. One scale.”

He pinched his lips into a thin line, and glared at Henjo. “Let me think about it,” he ground out, and Henjo wilted further.

“Is that all?” asked Jens, his expression far more amused than that of any of the ‘shifters. After all, as far as he could see he was in the clear.

Yoz shot him a dirty look. “Don’t be looking so bloody smug there, my lad, I need something from you too.”

Roars of amusement from the rest when he flinched, hard, even Weiki letting a grin tug at his face. She leaned closer to the pale faced guitarist, and her smirk was wicked. “Nothing too big, nothing fancy - I just need a wee slice of your soul.”

Amusement turned to protest, and she leaned back and laughed, waving her hands at the outraged audience to quiet them before going back to Jens, taking his hand and patting the back of it comfortingly.

Tobi grimaced, and she shot him a sly wink.

“No, I’m kidding. I just need a piece of skin from someone who isn’t affected by magic, someone without an ounce of esoteric talent. And you, my dear, are the most human-basic model I’ve ever seen. I don’t need much, just a bit about as big as a thumbnail. You will do it, won’t you?”

Henjo’s eyes burned into him over the Magus’ shoulder, and Weiki’s evil grin spurred him on. He could do this. After all, it wasn’t like she wanted anything vital, was it? Not like he was giving up a kidney, or a testicle.

 _That_ thought gave him a shudder.

“I can take it from someplace it won’t show,” she added, and her smile was kindly. He took a deep breath.

“Sure, I’ll do it.”

She clapped him on the shoulder. “Good man. By the way,” she added, expression turning thoughtful, “you’re not circumcised, are you?”

His heart fell to his boots with a thud.

“Er... no?”

Now her grin was evil enough to make even Weiki’s look saintly.

“Yet,” she said, and headed off to begin preparations.

__

~~tbc~~


	20. Nineteen

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The morning brought with it chaos and piles of luggage, as well as a large and boisterous argument as to who ought to clear up the mess on the floor of the smaller cabin.

_****_

Chapter Nineteen

Jens and Weiki were both walking rather carefully after Yoz had retrieved what she needed from them both. 

“What’s the matter with you?” asked Jens, eyeing the other guitarist. Weiki glared.

“She took a scale from my tail. My _tail_. And do you know where that is on the human body?”

“Oh.”

“Precisely. You?”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

To everyone’s surprise Dirk had insisted on being the ‘shifter to give the bone she needed, and between them they’d figured that the last tail vertebra would be the best one to remove. The wound it would leave would be small, and wouldn’t slow him down on stage - although it would make sitting down a little uncomfortable for a day or two. 

Those that had offered spell ingredients insisted that they be allowed to watch, Andi and Kai said that it would only be fair as they’d helped with the search and when Henjo told her that he didn’t mind if the rest were admitted she’d flung her hands up and suggested that they televise the event. She’d prowled and sworn at them all, but in the end had given in - albeit with the warning that the first one to disturb the process would be turned into a toad.

“And don’t think I can’t do it,” she snapped, and slammed the door when she left to set the main room of the other cabin up for the spell.

Shuffling themselves into position around the walls, Dani nudged Weiki with his elbow. “You were lying about not being able to change in this cold,” he said, eyes narrowed, “weren’t you?”

A snort, and Weiki tilted his head. “Maybe a little.”

“Bastard.”

“Got you out of that room, didn’t it?”

Tobi’s whisper was harsh, and travelled far further across the room than Jens wanted. “Where did she take the skin from?”

“You don’t want to know.”

“ _Really?_ ”

“Really, Tobi. Now shut up about it.”

Felix felt a hand slip into his, and turned to look at Eggi in some surprise. The bassist crowded next to him, his grin a little sheepish. “I don’t really want to be here,” he muttered, “but everyone else did so--”

“Didn’t want to look like a pussy, huh?”

“I thought that was you?” grinned their Dirk from his other side, and Felix tugged the brim of his cap down over his eyes before turning his attention back to a - now furiously blushing - Eggi.

“It’s OK,” he said, and slung one arm around his friend’s shoulders, “It’s all going to be OK.”

Eggi leaned into his side, and they watched the Magus continue with her preparations.

~*~

The circle was drawn, the equipment readied, the spell ingredients assembled - all bar one. Yoz touched Dirk’s arm, and ducked to look into his eyes.

“I need it now,” she said. “Are you sure about this?”

“Yes,” he replied, then looked across at the assembled men lined against the far wall to watch the show. “But you do it here.”

She reared back. “What? Why?”

“I want them to see it,” he replied firmly. “I want them to see what’s involved in magic.”

“They already know--”

“Not all of them,” he replied, and the flash in his eyes was anger. “Besides, I want them to see what you’re prepared to do. Prepared to do to _me_.”

“Is _that_ what this is about?”

“Just do it, Yoz.”

She opened her mouth to argue but thought better of it; the last thing they needed right now was to get into a screaming row in front of everybody - not to mention the fact that Henjo was already nervous enough to have rubbed right through his own arms.

“Fine. Are you going to change here?”

Despite the glare he began to prepare to do just that, although he did turn his back while he stripped. Yoz fought down the smirk when he was serenaded with a chorus of whistles - of the wolfish variety, naturally - and ribald comments, although she did nearly lose it when someone (she suspected Weikath) barked.

The flow into his Beast was almost graceful now, a world away from his first, tortured experience. He looked at her with those beautiful, calm eyes, and she sighed. “Come on then,” she said, and led him across to where Kai and Henjo waited. She beckoned Dan over, then also called Dani, Markus and Sascha across.

“Lie down,” she said to Dirk, and when he folded himself into a sphynx-like posture she kneeled before him, seized his ruff in both hands and gave his head a gentle shake. “I’ll make this as fast and painless as I can--”

“She lies,” muttered Weiki. Andi elbowed him.

“Smartmouth,” she grumbled, then turned back to the wolf. “But it’s going to hurt. That’s why I want the big bastards to pin you down, OK?”

Dani opened his mouth to object, but she carried straight on over him. “And Dani here to hang on to your head, because if you bite him he’ll not only bite you back but you can’t infect him. Got that?”

Acceptance in his eyes she positioned the men where she wanted them, the silver coat pretty much buried under the cover of the ones holding him still. She knelt behind him, pulled out a knife; first she trimmed the hair from the end of his brush, then felt for the exact place to strike.

“I feel sick,” muttered Eggi. Felix hugged him, made no comment when he turned his face into his shoulder.

“On three, gents,” she said, holding up two fingers and raising her eyebrows. They nodded in understanding, and she braced her free hand on the tail. “One, two--”

The thump of the knife echoed across the open space a split second before the wolf let out a huge roar and took off across the room - or tried to. Even so, with Dani hanging on to the long fur behind his ears and pointing the sharp teeth away from himself and three large men throwing every ounce of effort they had on his back he still made it a few feet; Yoz pounced on the tail when they brought him down with a thump, slapped her hand over the cut and bleeding surface.

“Hold him, boys!” she yelled, and the stink of burning flesh rose from where she’d cauterised the wound. Dirk shrieked and fought, the four men swearing mightily as they struggled with him.

“Let go!” she shouted, and he shot from under their arms like a bolt from a bow, turning himself before he ran right into the wall and lunging at his tormentors with jaws slammed together in a series of furious, angry snarls of threat. Yoz sat up, and cocked an eye at him before she grabbed his jeans and threw them across to land on his head.

“Fucking drama queen,” she told him.

~*~

Scene carefully re-set, Dirk now back in human shape and being ribbed mightily about his performance all was ready to go once more. She led Henjo to the centre of the circle - shirtless, the sweat of fear starting to shine on his skin - got him seated cross legged, and warned him what was about to happen. She raised her voice so that everyone could hear, still unconvinced that having so many observers was a good idea.

“Right, rule one - do _not_ panic. Whatever might appear, whatever you might think I _am_ in control. Got that?”

He nodded, bit his lip.

“See this bowl here?”

In front of him was a small brass bowl on a stand which contained the spell ingredients. Some he recognised - like the bloodied tip of Dirk’s tail and the iridescent scale from Weiki - but others he didn’t. And didn’t want to either, from the way some of them smelt. She showed him a packet of white powder, and winked.

“This is the powdered feather from an archangel’s wing - remember that arrogant bastard Michael?”

Henjo smiled, some of the tension fading from his eyes.

“Yeah, from his wings - some of the feathers that Hephaestus gave me after their little tryst. I’ll add this to the bowl, then a little bit of your blood and then rather more of mine. Don’t worry, it won’t hurt.”

“Liar,” said Weiki, Dirk and Jens, together. She shot them all the finger without looking back.

“And then we’re off. You got that?”

The pink tip of his tongue flicked out, moistened dry lips. “How will we know if it’s worked?”

“My room is open in that broom closet behind Tobi. It wanted to be as close to you as possible - so as soon as we’re done you get your backside in there and we can assess just how clever we’ve managed to be. OK?”

“OK,” he said, and she handed him the packet of white powder.

“Hold that - won’t be a sec, just got to make myself ready.”

She picked her way across the chalked lines, vanished into the broom closet that Tobi hadn’t realised was there; they all watched the door, wondering what would emerge. Make herself ready? What did that mean, precisely?

Kai shot Henjo a surreptitious thumbs-up while Weiki commiserated with Dirk about giving up a piece of one’s anatomy in the service of a fellow musician. The thump of the door grabbed their attention, and what they saw stole whatever smart comment they might have been tempted to make. This was the Magus, the creature and purveyor of magic; gone was the familiar form of Yoz the smartass, the one that could laugh with them and joke about anything.

She walked straight and tall, two long knives in patterned scabbards at her waist, a smooth sway to her hips that none of them had seen her use before; barefoot, only wearing very brief shorts and a halter top her tattoos all but blazed, some highlighted with extra body paint and others darkened with some substance that smelled of musk and mystery. Her hair writhed with a life of its own, the bolts of blue that flickered through it reflecting the dim light from the fire with a sparkle of wickedness.

It was her face that stunned them, though. Dirk was the only one who knew that her face was as tattooed as the rest of her body, and that somehow she hid that fact from the rest of the world every day. Not now, though; the patterns swayed like seaweed in a current, and her eyes touched each one of them and assessed, weighed, judged.

“Any one of you disrupts what I’m about to do,” she said, and even her voice was different - deeper, stronger. “And you could well kill Henjo, yourselves, or me. Any of that happens and I will not be very fucking amused. Got that, gentlemen?”

She waited until they’d all agreed, then with a sharp nod turned back to face the circle.

Kai jammed his fingers in his mouth to keep himself quiet, and she shot Henjo a swift wink. “Poseur,” said Dirk under his breath, and Weiki snickered.

Then she began.

~*~

She activated the circle, pacing the boundaries and scattering various strange substances from a pouch tied at her waist with the long-bladed knives, the first of which she drew to point to the four directions of the compass. Voice in a low chant it was as though she had no audience, each movement bringing a new element of the magic to life. The electric light had dimmed to nothing, only the flicker from the flames in the hearth illuminating the room - them, and the glow from the circle itself.

The white powder was added to the bowl, and on her knees in front of Henjo she gently took his left hand and opened it in front of her. She saw the four little crescent marks from his nails etched into his palm, and couldn’t quite stop the smile that quirked her elaborately marked features.

She ran a forefinger along his palm, and he felt a numbness in its wake; when she applied the long blade with all the delicacy of a surgeon with a scalpel he didn’t feel a thing, and once some of his blood had dripped into the bowl she gave him a pad of white cotton cloth to fold his fingers on until the bleeding stopped. 

Then she rose to her feet, put one knife back into its scabbard and drew the second.

Whereas the blade of the first had gleamed the silver of fine steel the blade of this one was black as obsidian, the light of the fire and the soft glow from the circle falling into it with no apparent reflection. She called aloud in a strange language, and stroked the blade down the inside of one arm. The softer skin there parted, and blood began to flow - a lot of it, and it pumped in a slow surge to run from her fingers when she held her arm horizontally, passing it over Henjo and the bowl before beginning a slow pace around the circle.

Her blood dripped, the soft patter of it falling audible even over the crackle of the flames in the hearth; her voice remained strong, even when she returned to her start point in front of a very startled Henjo, changed hands, and repeated the procedure on her other arm.

“Kai!” hissed Andi under his breath, and dug his fingers into the other man’s arms. Kai, staring hard at the figure of the Magus, shook his head sharply.

“She knows what she’s doing.”

“Are you sure?”

He snorted, and Andi fell silent - although the clutch he had on Kai’s arm didn’t reduce in strength.

Second circle complete she returned to the bowl, touched it with the bloodied point of the knife and chanted a series of short syllables, the tone demanding. A moment of hesitation and then the bowl rang like a bell, the contents catching fire and sending up a column of pure white light. She picked up the bowl, and they all heard the sizzle of her flesh on the heated metal; she passed it over Henjo’s head, then put her fingers into the glow of the liquid inside when the flames died down and dabbed some of it on his forehead, his temples, and one tiny dab over each eye.

Then she put the bowl down, took both of his hands in hers and completed the spell with a string of gentle words that curled around the minds of the listeners, a whisper of power that had more than one set of eyelids drooping with the soft, hypnotic tone. 

Then she sat back on her heels and took a deep breath, rising to break the circle with hands that shook a little; she bowed to the four directions of the compass, scuffed a gap in the chalk line with her bare foot and cocked her head to look at Henjo.

“Well, it’s done - want to go check it out?”

The light had risen again, the electrics apparently deciding that it was fine to go ahead and illuminate the room properly. Henjo staggered to his feet and made his way to the broom closet, the others stepping aside to let him through; some of them looked at the floor, the mess of spell ingredients, chalk, candle wax and blood promising one hell of a clean up job for whoever was unlucky enough to get that job.

Yoz waited, bloodstained arms folded, and watched the door. The designs on her face had vanished again, and several of the watchers wondered if they’d even really been there at all; Dirk tried to catch her eye, but she ignored him.

Henjo’s face, when he emerged, was delighted.

“I can still do it!” he said, excitement brightening his words, “I can still hear it, and it can still hear me!”

She took his chin in her fingers, leaned in to examine his eyes; nothing was amiss, no trace of the distance that had so worried her the last time she’d looked. Some damage was permanent, of course, but Henjo was still human and after a lot of effort it looked as though he would be staying that way.

Her fingers left bloody marks on his chin which he wiped off with a chuckle, the tired smile on her face echoing the far more excited one on his.

“We did it, boys,” she said with a grin, and fainted.

~*~

When she woke up she was curled up in the bed in her room, and Dirk was sprawled next to her. She blinked up at the canopy, and frowned.

“How’d I get in here?”

“I brought you,” he said. “Henjo opened the door.”

She wagged a finger at the ceiling, rather weakly, before letting her arm fall back to the bed with a heavy thump. “That was very naughty,” she told the air, “I said you could let him in once, not twice.”

A movement in the air and a goblet materialised on the small table next to the dragon lamp, steam curling gently from the surface of the dark liquid inside it.

“Tea?” he asked, and she struggled upright enough to take a sip.

“Nah,” she told him, “it’s a kind of mulled wine it knows I like - lots of herbs and spices. A very elegant apology, I feel,” she added, then let herself slump back on the pillows with a sigh.

“There’s a party next door,” he said to her, and she rolled her head to look at him, cocked an eyebrow.

“Do I look like I’m in any shape for a party?” she asked him. “I’ve just spent at least a couple of pints of blood - which I bet a good proportion of which is still on the floor out there, isn’t it? - and performed a major magic. I just want to sleep,” she continued, although she did lift an arm and sniff at herself, pulled a face. “Although a shower would probably not be a bad idea.”

“Oh,” he said, and looked down at the quilt, picked at a loose thread. Patterned fingers, still marked with dried blood, covered his own, stilled them.

“What’s the matter?” she asked, and his expression when he lifted his face was mournful.

“We leave tomorrow,” he said, “and you’ll catch Vega and then it’ll all be over, won’t it? And I’ll never see you again.”

She opened her arms and he crawled to her, the pair of them lying close together for a while, listenening to the beat of each other’s hearts and the racket of the thoughts that rattled around the inside of their own heads.

“Still a while to go yet,” she said, “so please. Can’t you just make the most of what we have left?”

He nuzzled at her throat, the smell of the blood bringing a growl up from deep within his broad chest that made her chuckle.

“I think I smell a bit too nasty for any of that, love,” she said, and gave him a kiss on his forehead. He looked up at her, and his eyes were shading to amber.

“You just smell of you,” he growled, and claimed her mouth for a much longer, deeper kiss. She moaned into his mouth, shifted her body beneath him; when they broke the contact they were both breathing hard, his eyes flickering back and forth between the amber of his Beast and the gentle blue-grey she knew so well.

“I’m a bit fragile at the moment,” she admitted with a laugh, and he turned up her sliced wrist - already healing - and kissed the pulse point, running his tongue along the reddened trail that the knife had left.

“I can be gentle,” he murmured, and with that she let him take her mind off magic, consequences, and leaving altogether.

~*~

The morning brought with it chaos and piles of luggage, as well as a large and boisterous argument as to who ought to clear up the mess on the floor of the smaller cabin.

“What,” asked Yoz over breakfast and yet another mug of tea, “ _none_ of you know how to use a mop? For shame, gentlemen!”

A general chorus of boos, hisses and fuck-you’s and she dragged Kai off to demonstrate the finer points of housekeeping magics, a few little tricks she claimed he might find useful at some point in the future. His declaration that he wouldn’t need them as long as she, a woman, was around to do it got him chased outside and rolled over in the snow a few times before being led - by one ear - to help her tidy up.

A convoy of SUVs turned up shortly after they returned, and they piled into them with much good-natured bantering and not a little ragging over the events of the last few days; a few thoughtful faces were to be seen, and were soon insulted into joining in with the general joviality of the day. All the men were looking forward to getting back to work, and only the Magus seemed to be fretting about the future, albeit quietly.

They might feel that the worst was over, but she feared that it might still be to come.

__

~~tbc~~


	21. Twenty

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> That word echoed through the mass, reflected and bounced back until it formed a chorus of hisses and clicks, eventually being lost in the mass of creatures and their strange, organic sounds.

_****_

Chapter Twenty

The Stockholm show went swimmingly, and Copenhagen the same; the fans were ecstatic to see the three bands, and sales of albums and merchandise were at an all time high. Travel was easy and smooth, and the miles and the countries flew by under the bus wheels; in fact, the only person not absolutely delighted with the whole thing was Yoz.

“That lanky bitch has got to be planning something,” she muttered one evening, hunched cross-legged in a corner of the lounge. She gripped her cigarette end in her teeth, and glared at Markus over the top of her hand of cards.

Andi gave a derisive snort. “She might even be dead,” he said, “and you’re wasting all this effort for nothing. Raise you ten.”

“She did look pretty beat up the last time you saw her,” Markus pointed out, hooded eyes giving nothing away as he pushed his chips across the table.

“So did I.”

“True,” said Henjo, and dumped his cards face down on the table with a sigh. “I fold. But at least you had us to make you feel better!”

Kai shook his head with a snort when Yoz stuck her tongue out at the other man, then settled back to examining his own hand. “See your ten and raise you, Andi. Yoz, just relax, will you? Maybe she’s gone. Maybe she is dead.”

“And maybe she’s just lurking in the fucking bushes waiting to blow us all up,” the Magus fretted, and stubbed out her cigarette end. “And this is ridiculous. I fold. Are you giving me shit cards on purpose, Hansen?”

“Of course not,” he replied, giving her his version of the Steely Eyes Of Doom. 

“Call, Kai. You have the worst poker face in the universe,” said Markus smugly, only to lose his smile when he saw Andi’s cards. Yoz laughed out loud, then leaned across to pat the big man on the back of the hand.

“Not as bad as yours, my friend. Now I think I’ll leave you boys to your game and go sulk in peace, if nobody minds.”

The smile faded as soon as her back was turned. She was serious, and no matter how lightly they took the matter somebody had to keep their eyes open. Her biggest fear was that the longer it was left, the bigger a bang her opponent would try to make - and she’d really had enough of noisy gestures for one lifetime. Especially when trying to watch out for a group of men who absolutely refused to take any of her fears seriously no matter _what_ they’d already been through.

She went back to her bunk, drew the curtain, and fretted.

~*~

Another night, another hotel, another show. Yoz had missed this one - as she had most of the others - out combing the streets of the city to see if she could discover a sniff of her nemesis. Not a damn thing, and even the ‘shifters of the city weren’t a great deal of help. The word had gone out, and if Vega showed so much as the tip of her nose then someone was going to chop it off. At the neck.

This should have helped her to relax but instead... it made it so much worse, somehow. Which didn’t make a great deal of sense, as she would be the first to admit. It shouldn’t. It just _did_.

Her thoughts ran in circles as she walked back to the hotel, collar of her jacket turned up against the bitter wind; she’d been propositioned a time or two, but nothing a nasty look and a sharp word couldn’t deal with. Stoned students and tourists melted out of her path, none but the terminally foolhardy willing to risk the aura of Instant Mayhem that she deliberately pushed ahead of herself.

The buses had returned to the hotel before her, but she didn’t bother to drop in on any of the guys. Too tired, too drained, too fed up to make nice. Dirk’s face was just getting longer the closer they got to the last date, to the point where she’d begun to avoid him; in point of fact she was pretty much avoiding everyone now, and the last date couldn’t get here fast enough. Maybe they were right, and she was being paranoid.

She pushed the gloom to the back of her mind long enough to unfold her room, a smile forming itself when she opened her eyes to perceive the marvellous stone vaults and polished oaken bookcases that replaced the sad beige and grey of the standard hotel room. Jacket tossed across the back of her desk chair she flung herself into the sofa that had been adopted as a permanent resident, and let a great sigh worm its way up from the sole of her boots until it rattled her teeth on the way out.

“Where is she?” she asked the spiders that made their homes in the dark recesses of the ceiling. “I know she’s out there somewhere. It’s just a matter of where--”

The knocking was a most unwelcome distraction; the spiders might not be a very chatty lot, but they were good listeners. As was her room, but even she sometimes felt it a little odd to spend all your time talking to thin air.

Still chuckling at her own whimsy - product of overtiredness and too much caffeine, she thought - she decided to take a chance, just pull the door open without checking who was behind it first. She could feel the disapproval heavy at her back, and looked up with a laugh when she laid her hand on the great iron ring that opened the door.

“Sometimes you just gotta live dangerously,” she said, and yanked the door open.

“Why?” said Markus, who’d caught the end of the statement, and peered round her with eyes wide. 

“Because,” she answered, and waved him through. “Just because. Markus, this is my room. Room, this is Markus.”

He stepped across the threshold, allowed himself to be pushed into the middle of the room so that she could swing the heavy door closed behind him. Her words had thrown him, and he frowned down at her; she patted his arm and towed him to the sofa, pushed him down in it and wandered off to find a bottle of wine and two glasses.

“So what can I do you for, Markus?” she asked, passing him a full glass.

“You have a nicer hotel room than I do,” he said with a smile. 

The temperature dropped a degree or two, and Yoz laughed.

“He’s making a joke,” she said aloud, then shook her head. “It can be a bit touchy with new people sometimes.”

“It really is alive?” he asked and his tone was filled with wonder. Yoz sipped her wine, then kicked her boots off and curled up in her corner of the sofa.

“Everything we’ve been through and you still have to ask that?”

He blushed, and looked down. Silence held, her watching him until the tension had grown so much that even her room felt as though it wanted to colour up and look away. She poked him with a sock-clad toe.

“Come on, big fella. What’s up?”

“I was talking to Dirk,” he said, still not looking at her, “and he told me that you’ve been to Hell.”

He looked up, and she sucked in her breath with a hiss at the horrible eagerness in his gaze. “Is that true? That you’ve been there?”

They always wanted to know. Anyone who’d lost someone, someone close, or in less than perfect circumstances. Are they there? Are they suffering? Why are they there? Is it my fault, can I do anything about it? Get them out, do something, do anything...

...and eventually it would drive them mad.

She should have seen this coming, and mentally kicked herself for not thinking of it sooner and heading the query off at the pass. And Dirk should have known better too; she’d had enough deep conversations with him as to the nature of Heaven, Hell, belief and lost souls. With Markus’ history he had no right to tell him anything.

Still. Time to play the hand that had been dealt.

“Yeah, I have,” she said quietly, and he leaned forward, teeth bared in his eagerness.

“Is he there?” he asked, and she could see the years of pent-up frustration behind the deceptively sleepy eyes, the dumb act, the easy-going nature. “ _Is he?_ ”

“Listen to me, Markus,” she said, and hoped like Hell (no pun intended, she thought with a wince) he was actually listening, “you’re a practising Catholic, that much I do know. So you know what you believe, right?”

A moment of stillness, as though he wasn’t even breathing and would never breathe again, then he nodded once, twice. He never dropped that gaze, and neither did she. _Tread carefully, Yoz_ , whispered her own voice in her mind, the rarely-heard voice of her conscience. _Fuck this up, and you’ll do untold damage...._

“Belief is the key,” she continued, her voice pitched low, soothing. His pain vibrated through the air, held his teeth edged together. “What did he believe? Do you know?”

The name hung heavy between them, an unspoken wraith that watched, a palpable force that were its name uttered might well destroy this man sharing her sofa, her wine, her very air. _Ingo_. The drummer who couldn’t cope, Markus’ friend, the suicide that he’d never, actually, quite learned to cope with - despite appearances to the contrary. And now he was torturing himself further, running every scenario through his mind, every description of Hell and the self-blame was creeping back, he knew he could have stopped it if he’d tried _just that little bit harder--_

“Markus!” she snapped, put her glass aside and clapped her hands in front of his nose. He shuddered, blinked; she took his glass from his hands before he could crush it, and tucked herself as close to the big body as she could. He needed contact, live, warm human contact - and she was it, right now. She nudged his arm over her shoulders and ran hers around his waist, hugged him close. He felt cold, and couldn’t stop the shivering that shook him from head to toe and all the way back again.

He laid his head on hers, and sighed.

“I need to know if he’s in Hell,” he said.

“I can’t tell you that.”

“Why not?”

The passion had burned itself out, and now he just sounded tired. Tired and old.

“Because I can’t. Heaven, Hell, purgatory, oblivion - believe me, it’s not as simple as you think. What each soul goes through is as individual as they are, and short of hunting him down I can’t be sure exactly where he is or what he’s going through. One thing I do know, though,” and she bent herself around, used her free hand to tip his chin up, gave it a pinch until he met her eyes, “it wasn’t your fault.”

He frowned. “Are you saying it was his? Because that’s--”

“I’m not saying it was anybody’s fault, Markus. It happened, and there wasn’t a damn thing you could do to prevent it - some things are going to happen, and that’s an end of it.”

“It was my fault,” he said quietly, and she shook her head no.

“We can sit here all night and argue that back and forth, mate. Yes it was, no it wasn’t, yes it was - you do see that, don’t you?”

A nod, and she pressed herself to him tighter, closer. She could feel his heart beating, the broad chest rattling with the force of it; she laid her hand over it, rubbed small circles, poured every ounce of compassion she had into the contact.

“It. Was. Not. Your. Doing. What will it take to make you believe that?”

His expression was piteous, but at least the fury had abated. “Is he in Hell, Yoz?”

She let her head thump into his chest. “I don’t _know_ , Markus. And even if I did - which I don’t - then tell me what telling you is going to achieve? Won’t it just make you more miserable?”

“I need to know.”

She leaned back, disentangled herself but kept one hand in the centre of his chest. “Why, Markus?”

“Maybe I can do enough penance to get him out, do something--”

“Stop,” she said. “Stop right there. How do I explain this to you?” She got up, began to pace the floor; this was getting out of hand, and she had to think of something, _fast_. Because to give him the bald truth would destroy whatever faith he still clung to, would hollow out his eyes and scrape clean his soul and then who the fuck knew what would happen? She stopped in front of him, dropped to her knees, clutched at both of his hands. “It doesn’t work like that,” she said, staying calm with an effort. “All you’d be doing is putting yourself through a lot of pain for nothing. He’s out of your reach, Markus - you have to let him go.”

He reached down to retrieve his wine glass, and drained it in a single draught before he got up, edged past her and strode to the door. One hand on it, he turned to speak over his shoulder. 

“I can’t.”

“Markus--”

“Can you find him?”

She blinked, and he turned to press his shoulder blades against the ancient oak. His eyes had gone flat again, and she felt a thread of fear begin to wind around her heart. He was, if nothing else, a very big guy - a very big guy with a lot of Issues to work through and, when it came to this particular subject, a hair-trigger temper. And like most big, gentle blokes, when he exploded it would be _spectacular_.

She didn’t want to hurt him. Fuck it, she didn’t want to get hurt. And he could hurt her, if he tried.

“Can you?”

One shoulder raised in a cautious shrug. “Possibly. But why--”

“Find him,” he said, then turned and left, dragging the heavy door shut with such a slam that several books fell from their shelves, and even the dragon lamp just visible in the bedroom turned the green glow of its eyes to look in surprise. She stared at the door in astonishment, then let all her breath out in a rush.

“That went well.”

The fire popped loudly. With a shake of her head she went to retrieve wine bottle and glass, settled herself at her desk and rummaged in the drawers for one of her scrying instruments. Crystal ball found and installed - in the top of a coffee mug with a chip in the rim - she rattled her fingers over the top of it, wondering if doing as he asked was the right thing. 

Well, no. But then, she didn’t have to tell him what she found, did she? And maybe it would be information that could come in handy, one day. And that said--

Before she began the search, she pulled out a piece of paper and a biro with a much-chewed end, and began to compose a letter.

~*~

Penultimate night, across the channel and she felt it in her bones the moment they made landfall. It had been so long, and she’d travelled so far--

England. Albion. _Home_.

Even Dirk laughed at her, face pressed up against the bus window and eyes wide to soak up as much of the dull view of motorway verge as possible; she explained that it was the principle of the thing, and that as soon as they had a stop and she could actually get out there she could say hello properly.

“Yoz, it’s a country,” objected Sascha. “How can you say hello to it?”

She pointed at Henjo. “Ask him,” she said, and flew up the bus stairs to her bunk. Dirk, as she’d feared, followed her. He found her stuffing bits and pieces of clothing into her horrible backpack, the stained and disreputable item as much a part of her as the leather jacket that had seen better days, or the blue streaks in her hair.

“Don’t look like that,” she said, without looking up at him. 

His mouth turned down even further, and she scrambled fully into the bunk, dragged him with her and yanked the curtain shut before she pounced, pinning him flat.

“What--”

She planted a kiss on him, dug her hands into his hair, wrapped it around her fingers and tugged it hard even as she ravished him with her tongue, gripped him with her thighs, rubbed and dry-humped against him. By the time she broke for air he was flushed, startled, and so hard he ached.

“Just because I’m leaving doesn’t mean I don’t like you,” she whispered against his lips, “it’s just got to happen. Get it?”

“But--”

“Oh, shut up and fuck me,” she growled.

That seemed to distract him quite nicely.

~*~

The hotel was a twenty minute walk from the venue, and it took Yoz all of about five seconds to vanish once the room allocations had been handed out. She dumped her gear with Dirk - who appeared to have a very slight limp due to enthusiastic athleticism in too confined a space - and promised she would be back before the show, then trotted out the door without a backward glance.

He knew when she did return, because she broke into his room and sneaked into bed with him; he didn’t ask any questions, just wrapped his arms around her and buried his face in her hair, tried to imprint the smell and the feel of her into his memory.

“Any luck?”

“She’s in the city,” came the sleepy reply, “but fuck knows where. London’s a big place. I’ll catch her, never fear.”

But by the time he woke up she was gone again.

~*~

This time she’d taken her bag, and although nobody dared say it to his face the general consensus was that she’d vanished - or, to use the parlance of one of the English roadies: “She’s up and done a bloody runner, ain’t she?”

It wasn’t until the last soundcheck had been completed, everything made ready and all three bands had nothing to do but wait that she reappeared, fighting her way through the boisterous crowds of fans that hovered outside in order to hammer on the stage door to be let in.

“Evening gents,” she said cheerfully, her good-humoured call echoing through the corridors and knocking even more flakes of paint from the peeling walls. “Ah, Hammersmith! Love this venue. Knackered and ageing as it is. This is history right here, this is - Henjo! Have you spoken to it?”

She strolled into the green room, ruffled Markus’ curls, plonked herself into Dirk’s lap and kissed him soundly when he wheezed that she’d just landed on his balls.

“Nonsense, my dear. So, are we all ready for the last night?”

A series of mumbles greeted her words, and her grin was wicked. “You all thought I’d fucked off, didn’t you?”

“No!”

“Course not!”

“Knew you’d be back.”

“As if.”

“No, we knew--”

“Nah.”

“Yes,” said Weiki, and she laughed.

“Ah, my dear reptile. Truthful as ever.”

“You’re in a good mood,” said Kai, and offered her a cigarette. She took it, pinched it between her teeth and grinned at him as she lit it with a flick of her fingers.

“Course I am,” she replied between puffs, “Vega’s in the city, and there’s been an unconfirmed sighting down in Docklands. The rats are all over it - by this time tomorrow her head’s going to be on a spike at the back of King Rat’s throne. I’ll send you a picture.”

Kai looked pained. “I don’t think you need to bother,” he said, and she chuckled before bouncing from Dirk’s lap and wandering off to find the Edguys. She didn’t want the chance to annoy - or frighten - Tobi to pass without being marked in some fashion.

Andi looked up from the piece of paper he was making notes on. “Kai, are you guys good with doing the last couple of numbers with us, the second encore?”

In moments they were deep in technical discussion, and the giant sorceress all but forgotten.

~*~

Helloween had taken the stage, the roar of the crowd thunderous even back here. Yoz had followed Gamma Ray backstage, teasing them all mercilessly over perceived cock-ups in this, their final and all important show. They would be going back out on stage for the second encore for two songs, instead of the one that had been their habit for the last few shows; then they’d be off back to the hotel to party into the wee small hours, and then they would board the buses and go home.

“Guys,” said Yoz, and shot Felix a glare. He grinned at her, rounded up his band - despite Tobi’s loud objections that he was missing something - and shooed them off; she was left with just her five co-conspirators in the green room, and Kai cocked an eyebrow at her.

“Are we in trouble?”

“Nah,” she said, then sighed. “Look, we probably won’t get chance later. I’ll stick around for the party,” and her hand, much to Dirk’s surprise, crept into his and squeezed his fingers, “and probably give my lad here a goodbye shag. But then I’ll be gone and that, I’m afraid, will be an end of it. So I figured I’d grab a moment to say - well, goodbye, I guess. We’ve had some times, hmm?”

Eero slapped a hand over his eyes. “Some _times_ ,” he snorted. “Kasperi still has nightmares about you, you know.”

“And so he fucking should,” she grinned.

“Voodoo in Hamburg,” shuddered Henjo.

“Bats,” grinned Kai.

“Oh please. Biggest fucking centipedes I’ve ever seen, remember those?” added Eero, leaning into Dan’s side.

“Centaurs,” said Dan, with a tilt of his head at Dirk, “and angels.”

“And demons,” finished Dirk, then put an arm around Yoz’ shoulders. “And you.”

“But what if something comes for us again?” Dan asked, and she rolled her eyes.

“Between Henjo being able to talk to any building anywhere, Dirk’s Beast, Kai’s alarmingly strong abilities - which I’m hoping he won’t get any urge to show off or experiment with - Dan’s strong right arm and Eero’s abilities to run like Hell I honestly don’t think there’s much you lot can’t cope with. Truly.”

“But--”

“Oh for fuck’s sake,” she sighed. “Here. Right hands, gents.”

They held them out, and she laid one on top of the other until she could clasp her own hands around them, then she gave them a pat and pointed at the juncture of all five men. “You have that. You have a link and a bond and the whole is more than the sum of its parts - as Kai knows all too well. There’s your shine, boys. Remember that, and you really don’t need me.”

There was silence for a moment, and then they were interrupted by a slow handclap from a shadowed corner of the room.

“Very touching,” said a smooth, female voice. “Very nice, Magus. I want to weep.”

The five men drew back, and Yoz rolled her eyes as she turned.

“Vega,” she said.

~*~

The sorceress was not in good shape. Far from the elegance she had carried off with such a seeming lack of effort every other time they’d seen her she now was dressed in little more than rags; tattered jeans cinched tight around her waist with a frayed leather belt, canvas shoes coming apart at the seams, a ratty tee shirt and dirty bomber jacket - a size too small - complemented the dirty, thin hair and the scars that were almost all that remained of her face. Of the impeccably manicured nails there was no sign; the few nails she had left that the snake’s venom hadn’t burned away were crusted black, the fingers of one hand apparently useless, twisted into claws and held close to her body.

“You look like shit,” snapped Yoz, and took two fast paces forward. 

Vega dropped a package to the floor, and vanished.

“Not this time, cully,” snapped their Magus, and she too was gone into thin air, the two women leaving behind no more than a wisp of a draught in their wake. Felix, Tobi and the others ran back in, all ten men milling around the room in shock while they tried to work out what had just happened - beyond the obvious, that was.

It was Tobi spotted the small package that the sorceress had dropped, and crouched near it. He cocked his head on one side, reached out and gave it a poke; it twitched, the paper covering rustling as something inside moved.

“What’s this?” he asked, and poked it again.

The rustling got louder.

Felix joined him, grabbing Tobi’s wrist before he could poke the package a third time. “Don’t. It smells like Vega - and vinegar?” he finished, his voice rising in query.

A series of detonations below them brought the two ‘shifters to their feet. The floor vibrated, the rustling of the package growing stronger as whatever it was under them got louder, closer.

“Vinegar?” said Eero, and then he blanched. “Oh God, no--”

The concrete floor beneath the cheap, thin green carpet split with a crack like rifle fire, the nylon threads and tufts sagging for a moment before they tore open to reveal a split in the floor, three feet long by about six inches wide. Not a huge hole, as unexpected cracks in the ground went, but enough to have them all backing up to what they hoped was a safe distance.

The package gave a heave, and the paper ripped away as whatever had been hidden tore its way free.

Doors slammed, the sound hidden under the shrieks of horror as the enormous scarlet centipede curled back on itself, skittering to the edge of the hole to wave its antennae before darting toward the men in a rush, changing course at the last moment to dive beneath a ratty sofa, emerging again a scant second later to peer back down into the hole again. The reason why became clear very shortly after that; more antennae waved, and the slit in the floor proved to be more than large enough to admit a horde of clicking, squeaking arthropods with very large jaws. 

Large, _sharp_ jaws.

As one the men bolted, out of the green room and into the corridor that led to the emergency exits; they found the steel doors locked, and raced back the other way, deeper into the building. Someone must have been working late in the office beside what had been the green room, because the screaming that came from behind a partition wall ended with a horrible crunch, and a wave of clicking and squeaking - then something that sounded like a million tiny jaws all chewing at once.

The other end of the long corridor gave them the same result - a locked door - which left only the branch that led to the stage, and the auditorium; not only were their friends on stage, but the venue was filled to capacity. 

Five thousand people.

“We can’t let it get through there!” shouted Dan, and they clustered together in front of the opening that, if they failed, would lead to the biggest mass murder this city had seen in a long, long time. The only weapons they had managed to gather were several fire extinguishers, a couple of red water ones and even a brace of tiny black CO2 models - poor fare against the tide that rolled out of the green room doors and advanced up the corridor toward them.

Dirk took a step forward, glanced back over his shoulder. “Those are no good,” he said, then swallowed. Hard. “I’m going to try and talk to it.”

“You’re _what?_ ” yelped Eggi, echoed by pretty much all his colleagues.

“What the hell _are_ those things?” said Tobi, covering his nose and mouth against the sharp, acrid odour that accompanied the carpet of antennae, claws and snapping jaws.

“It’s called Styx,” said Kai. “We’ll explain later.”

“If there is a later,” breathed Eero.

Dirk moved ahead, and waited for the creatures to grow a little closer. The largest ones were but a few feet from his boot, readying themselves to strike when he spoke.

“Styx,” he said. “Stop!”

To their astonishment, the wave of beasts did just that, flowing up and along and over each other until he faced a seething mass that would, had he waded into them, have been knee deep; they clustered on the walls beside him and hung from the ceiling, the whisper and the chatter and the ceaseless mutter of their armour-clad bodies filling the listener’s ears.

And then the Edguys fell back with horror, because the nightmare spoke.

“dirk.”

“we remember.” 

“dirk. yes.”

A tower of the creatures formed just in front of him, with a particularly large specimen leaning close enough to brush Dirk’s face with its antennae. He didn’t flinch, just waited for it to look him over, and then the tower collapsed into the seething mass and a face made of the bodies of the centipedes defined itself on the wall beside him.

“no yoz this. time.”

“dirk just.”

“yoz’. boys.”

“shame.” 

“shame. shame shame....”

That word echoed through the mass, reflected and bounced back until it formed a chorus of hisses and clicks, eventually being lost in the mass of creatures and their strange, organic sounds.

“goodnight. dirk.” said Styx, and lunged forward.

__

~~tbc~~


	22. Twenty One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Skeins of jewels glittered in the crust of the planet, metals like ropes of gilded splendour decorated its home, and it ran in a ceaseless song of joy of work and care, cleaning, maintaining—defending.

_****_

Chapter Twenty-One

The fall through the dark was unpleasant, at best. Yoz could translocate, it was a necessary skill in her line of work; however, it wasn’t one she particularly enjoyed, and she’d normally found that astral travel was far less unpleasant and got the job done, in most cases, just as well. Plus somebody usually owed her enough of a favour that she could persuade them to wear themselves out shifting her through space, which left her ready to work - or dodge enemies, or run like Hell, whatever action was most appropriate - upon arrival.

Then there was hitchhiking, public transport, stolen cars, even flying - although she did prefer to save that for absolute emergencies. If the universe had meant her to fly, she would have access to a stable full of winged horses.

The point was that she’d let her skill at this particular mode of transport stagnate; she could do it if she had to, but that was about it. And the unpleasant truth was that Vega was much, much better at it than she was.

So she’d been practicing. The trick was power; Vega, of course, had no qualms about grabbing the nearest probably-innocent bystander (nobody, in Yoz’ book, being entirely innocent) and draining them to nothing to boost her jumps. The Magus’ soul was tarnished enough already without her adding randomised murder to her list of transgressions. Well, unless the person really deserved it, of course.

The other solution - if you were talking about not sending someone to an untimely demise and thus condemning their soul - was to take the energy of the newborn, the almost born and the unborn, and Yoz just wasn’t that sick. Or heartless.

Vega was.

So in order to perfect the skill of flinging herself into the ether in pursuit of her quarry she’d had to come up with a way of obtaining power without doing much damage to her surroundings, and to be fair she’d done it; it had taken a great deal of study and a certain amount of surreptitious testing on the fans who attended the shows, but she’d got the hang of it at last.

She could drop back into reality, extend a network of filaments over a large area and siphon just enough energy from as many people as necessary to boost the next jump.

She just hoped that Vega didn’t like jumping into uninhabited places.

~*~

She needn’t have worried. The first jump was the longest; Yoz hit the concrete at a dead run and almost flattened her nose on a crumble of brick wall, heat and humidity striking her in the face like a wet towel. Vega was drooped over a body, further down the alley; the smells and the sounds were distinct enough from where they’d just been that Yoz was sure they weren’t in Europe any more.

 _Here goes nothing_ , she thought, and tried her new skill.

It worked, and she felt the strength from a thousand surrounding bodies wallop into her system like shot of adrenaline straight into the heart muscle.

“Vega!” she roared, and set off after her quarry at a run. The sorceress’ face was a picture; she hadn’t expected Yoz to follow, and even if she had she wouldn’t be expecting her to be in such good condition after such a long jump. She’d had to drain two derelicts completely to regain the energy just to stand up, and her eyes - one of which was blind, milky and sightless from the venom burns - opened wide in shock.

“India, Vega?” snapped Yoz, and reached out for her. “Black Hole of Calcutta got nothing on you, bitch.”

She vanished, and Yoz followed.

~*~

Place to place, each stop just long enough for the increasingly panicked sorceress to regain the energy to jump again, Yoz growing more confident each time. She could feel that they were getting closer to home, each jump through the howling chaos of the ether that surrounded reality bringing them a stride closer to the place they’d started from.

And Vega remained just one step ahead of the Magus, just out of reach of fingers that snatched and the vile fury that wanted nothing more than to turn her into a steaming pile of rank offal.

But she ran, and she ran, and Yoz couldn’t quite catch her.

~*~

Her mistake was tiny, and completely understandable. In her stress and fear she reached out for somewhere that was familiar, somewhere she’d once called home; a small fishing village on the coast of France, a fact that surprised Yoz, considering that the big bitch had no trace of an accent.

Still, she supposed after everything Vega had gone through here as a kid then she would have done her best to erase any traces of her roots; all that remained was the hate and the fury, the desolation that drove her to not just try to end the world, but to seek the destruction of everything within the entire universe.

She hit the ground - hard - on all fours, and staggered upright just in time to see the sorceress hammering on the door of a cottage. She demanded to be let in, her voice ragged in a throat too torn by screaming to make much sense, and Yoz knew she’d got her. 

The house was empty, abandoned; looked as though it had been like that for quite some time, too. But the village, spread below them in a twinkle of fairytale lights, was more than close enough for her own needs, and the process of refuelling was by now instinctive.

She got her breath back, straightened her jacket, and crept up behind the wailing woman.

“Gotcha,” she hissed in her ear, and clamped both hands on her shoulders.

Vega’s howl was the loudest yet, and she dove back into the darkness once more; but this time, she carried the Magus with her.

~*~

And they were back. London. Somewhere in the north, by the feel of it, the rumble of traffic overhead and all around indicating a series of concrete flyovers and underpasses, the sorceress having made her final lair amongst the rubbish and the derelicts that crouched in the dubious shelter of the pollution that belched from the constant, heavy traffic. Barely a weed grew here, and rubbish lay in windblown drifts around the stout concrete pillars, streaked with rust from their immobile joints and leery with the badly-spelled graffiti of the disaffected and the stupid.

Yoz bore her down, pinned her with hard knees while she punched her a few times, getting a couple of nice solid blows to the once-beautiful head in to quiet her prey down. She reached into her jacket, and pulled out a knife; not quite as long as the athames she’d used in Henjo’s ritual nor as well made, it nevertheless had the look of an implement designed to kill. No more buggering about.

“Enough, Vega,” snapped the Magus, “goodbye.”

One long, thin arm flashed up, and grabbed the Magus’ wrist. Yoz swore, and pressed harder; Vega resisted, and from her bloodied mouth came laughter. Nothing insane in the sound, just a real sense of joy, and at the drift of the sweetness across the rubbish came a response. Vega’s most recent minions crawled from their cardboard boxes to worship at the feet of their leader, wet eyes black from one rim to the other with the seeds of her beloved Dark.

Yoz pulled back, and sat on her heels.

“OK, I’ll bite. What’s so fucking funny?”

“You.”

“And that would be why, exactly? I _win_ , Vega - I’m going to gut you right here and I don’t care how many bums you’re trying to get crawling up on me.”

“You win, yes. But you came after me so fast you forgot to check on your beloved musicians, didn’t you?”

Something cold moved in Yoz’ stomach. Something icy, and wicked.

“Kai’s there,” she said with a shrug. “I’m sure he can cope.”

Vega laughed again and Yoz decided that cold fear in the guts or not, she really had to cut that long white throat and have done with it. The woman was really, really beginning to piss her off.

“With the Styx?” she asked, and Yoz froze.

 _Styx. Oh..._ shit.

“You set Styx on them,” she said, her lips barely able to move through the sudden icy terror that coated them. Vega nodded, sighed as she relaxed back onto her bed of filthy trash.

“I called it and it came. It fought me, but I was stronger. By the time you get back they will all be gone - and I made sure it could only get out through the crowd.”

“Vega, there’s _five thousand people_ in that auditorium!”

The sorceress shrugged. “Then it will eat well. Do your worst, Magus,” and her eyes cocked to meet Yoz’, the ruined lips curled into a shadow of that once wonderful smile. “Because I? Win.”

“I’ve got a better idea,” snarled Yoz, and slammed her hand down in the centre of Vega’s chest, stole what energy remained within the ravaged frame; she left her just enough to remain conscious, but not enough to move. “Stay there, bitch.”

And with that, she vanished.

~*~

“made you.”

“jump. dirk made. you.”

“scared.”

“Fucking _Hell_ , Styx!”

“now we.” 

“must eat you.” 

“sorry.”

“Now wait, wait,” Dirk said, amazed that he hadn’t actually dropped dead of a heart attack when the tide had surged toward him. From the noises behind him, someone had been frightened enough to throw up. “Wait a second!”

“did not.”

“take good care. of my children, dirk. they.”

“hunger.”

“hunger.”

“am. sorry.”

It loomed over him again, a seething wave of scarlet horror that wanted his flesh to make more of its own. He noticed one of the smaller creatures by his foot, on its back and waving its claws helplessly in the air. He reached out a toe, turned it over. It cocked its head at him, then limped back to join its fellows.

“compassion? compassion.”

“despite. danger.”

Now it seemed to be talking to itself, words like ‘brave’ and ‘friend’ hissed back and forth through the shifting scarlet tide.

A rush of whispers, the brush of chitin and a squeak of horror from behind him. Faces swirled in the mass, formed and dissolved before they could get a word out; Styx seemed confused, not sure what to say. Now he looked more closely he could see more like the one he’d turned over, some sagging close to the floor, others with malformed limbs.

Styx was right; its body, the supposedly immortal river of centipedes that made up its mind and its very being, were coping very badly with being above ground. 

“Go back below,” he said carefully. “There must be food down there - rubbish, rats? Something.”

A red twist of spiky limbs fell past his shoulder, and this time it didn’t move when he nudged it with his toe. He took a deep breath, went to one knee, and picked up the limp body of the many limbed creature; it felt warm to the touch, its protective covering waxy and hard. He flipped it over, and let his fingers skate across the marvellously jointed armour. It really was, if you could look at it objectively, quite beautiful; the plates shone with an iridescence you didn’t see often in nature, except in fine opals or within the deep-lit fire of a diamond. Certainly never on a living creature; this glittered like a jewel.

“could. could.”

“would.” 

“like you. like you guys. friends. like.”

“except the. one who.”

“has.”

“thrown up.”

“coward.”

“should have eaten. him last.”

“time.”

“Ee _ro_ ,” said Dirk, and rubbed a hand across his eyes.

“Sorry,” squeaked the young Finn. Styx sent a small party of centipedes to run past Dirk; he raised a hand to stop anybody moving, and although Tobi made a series of high-pitched chittering noises and Jens threatened to step on them, the little group returned to the main body safely, albeit some of the smaller ones trailed their limbs in apparent weariness.

“can. eat.”

“the new.”

“ones?”

“We’d really rather you didn’t. Look, Styx,” said Dirk, wracked his brain to think of a way out of this. He hoped that Kai was doing something clever behind him or Henjo was negotiating with the building to drop all the scuttling horrors into the sewers because otherwise they were fucked, “can you not go below? Not far. The sewers must be full of good things to eat.”

More of the roiling, and he got the distinct impression that the centipedes really didn’t want to eat them. They would, if they had to; that was what Styx was like. It had a sense of humour and it would talk to you, could even play practical jokes, but in the end if it was hungry you were meat.

For right now, though, it seemed to be thinking as hard as he to come up with a compromise.

“she has.”

“blocked.”

“blocked!”

“cannot. leave this.”

“place.”

“only way out.”

“through.”

“through.”

“Vega has blocked you?”

“What a bitch,” muttered Kai from behind Dirk’s shoulder. He’d made his way forward, and cocked his head to regard the seething mass of creatures that filled the corridor. Time was getting short; Helloween were approaching the end of their set, and very shortly they would come charging offstage and run smack into the middle of - this. And then the slaughter would begin, of that they had no doubt. Styx could only hold back for so long.

“kai. kai. hello.”

“she is. she is. not. like.”

“the magus. yoz.”

“yoz has. respect.”

“respects us. me. us.”

“Respect for _that?_ ”

Styx shot out a limb made of a twined mass of centipedes. “i want.”

“that one!”

Jens cowered, and even Eero managed to shoot him a dirty look. Kai stepped forward - close enough that the leading edge of the wave had to scuttle back a few inches to avoid being stepped on - and raised both hands. “Styx, if you show me the magic I can break it. You can go below and feed all you like, get your strength up - just no eating people, OK?”

A centipede as long as his arm ran up his side, and perched on his shoulder. Eero threw up again. Kai just eyed it without moving his head; at least if this one attacked, he knew the end would be fast.

Unpleasant, but fast.

“brave. brave.”

“clever.”

“yoz. yoz picked. well.”

“you want?”

“we do. do this.”

“look. look. look into.”

“ME....”

Kai turned his head, and stared into the glittering black compound eyes of the creature that clung to his shoulder. He nodded, frowned at it; Dirk could sense some enormous struggle, but whether it was to understand or overwhelm he just couldn’t tell. 

And then Kai smiled, closed his eyes, and stepped into the mass before them. He opened his arms, and as gracefully as though he were diving from a high board he fell forward into the sea of monsters, and let them close over his head and body until no trace of him could be seen.

~*~

Yoz hit the ground running, but skidded to a halt in the sheer horror of what she saw. 

The green room was wrecked. The tables overturned, every scrap and morsel of food, of anything organic was gone; the wood of the tables showed great scores as though an army of rats had been at them, and of the cloths that had covered the tables there was not so much as a thread left.

She supposed they’d been of cotton, and thus fuelled Styx just as well as anything else.

Of her friends there were no signs at all.

She sat down with a bump on the floor. 

_Now is not a good time to fall apart_ , said her conscience firmly; after all, she could still hear music-noises through the walls, and the crowd sure didn’t sound like they were being eaten alive, so maybe there was still something she could do.

She came round the corner just in time to see Kai fall beneath the sea of scarlet, scuttling bodies, and let out a wail that shook the battered walls themselves.

“Kai, _NO!_ ”

~*~

She advanced on Styx, fists clenched, shoulders up; she had not gone through all this just to lose this way. No chance. She was going to get her revenge, and if Vega could use Styx then dammit, so could she. Somewhere outside her fury she could hear shouting, Dirk’s voice, Dan, Henjo, others; she couldn’t give a fuck what they were saying, she just had a bone to pick - ha! Poor choice of words - with the centipedes that now retreated before her coldly savage expression.

“yoz.”

“yoz.”

“he is. unharmed.”

“yoz, listen. magus. magus.”

“we are weak. magus.”

Dirk couldn’t believe what he was hearing. Styx was almost - almost - begging. But then, considering the bleak intensity on the face of the Magus he wasn’t entirely surprised; he would have run away had he thought that expression was directed at him. Half a dozen of the largest had scrambled up his back, and peeped over his shoulders; still more pressed behind his legs, and he realised that Styx was using him as a shield.

The centipedes rolled back, a red sea parting before its own personal Moses; she pulled up when she was surrounded by it, folded her arms - and glared.

Weiki would have been proud.

“What have you done to him?” she snarled.

“magus. he. would help.”

“shine. you are. right to choose.”

“him. he. shines.”

“so bright.”

“helps us. magus. the other one.”

“hurts.”

“sick.”

“dying.”

“Give him back!”

And to the utter astonishment of the watchers, considering how completely Styx had destroyed everything else it had come into contact with, Kai’s body rolled to the surface of the surging tide. His limbs flopped loosely, his red hair a sharper tang of orange against the scarlet of chitinous backs but he was definitely breathing, although pale.

“he works. with us. to.”

“break.”

“her spell.”

She hesitated for just the barest second, then grinned. “Need a hand?” she asked, and the susurration of relief was enough to make Dirk smile, although it sounded as though Eero had the heaves again. Not a squeak had been heard from Henjo, and if Dirk knew his friend he was safely behind the solid wall of Daniel, eyes screwed shut and waiting for the nightmare to go away.

The sound of the crowd increased, pulsed loud around their ears, and then a blast of new voices broke over them.

“What the fuck--” said Andi, and Styx roared to the attack.

~*~

Kai felt his mind drift back to consciousness, a slow rise through layers of rock that glowed all the colours of the rainbow, the very heartbeat of the planet thumping majestic and slow through his body. He understood now; this was the realm of the Styx, the guardian and the caretaker of the world below. Skeins of jewels glittered in the crust of the planet, metals like ropes of gilded splendour decorated its home, and it ran in a ceaseless song of joy of work and care, cleaning, maintaining - defending.

When Yoz had called it she had bargained, negotiated; she had changed her own body chemistry to ferry the egg cases safely through the poison of the oxygen atmosphere of the above world, and Styx had been grateful. For its children were a part of it, always reborn, a constant recycling of experience and mind and flesh. But that didn’t mean that it couldn’t feel pain; Styx could feel every emotion that any other sentience could, and could sing for joy in its superheated home just as readily as it could weep for the pain of its children when they died.

Vega had dragged it, protesting and screeching in the ache of being forced out of its element, and locked it to her will by magic. Cruel magic, hurtful magic; when it recognised Dirk - and him, and Henjo and Dan and even Eero - it had seen a chance for escape, and perhaps even for redemption. It knew it was being used for evil, and while it cared nothing for the individuals that made up the crowd or even the other bands, it recognised the awful Dark very well indeed.

For Styx brought the light of life to every dark place under the crust of the world, and revelled in doing so. Styx was life where none could be.

And so it handled Kai with a gentleness he had never expected, showed him how the magic caught and bound; he joined his mind to that of the immortal being in so much pain, and together their light broke the dark enchantment that bound it. All would be well, but then a new awareness broke over them; it was the Magus, and she was angry.

Kai tried to protest, to speak to her, but he was too far down, too locked in the cycle of below and in the process of taking off the last of Vega’s vicious bonds. 

But then the reds and oranges of anger shaded to the blues of acceptance, and even the green of amusement; she had understood, the humans she cared for so much - and from this perspective it was blindingly clear, her fondness even deep enough to be called, by some, love - all safe, and Styx too.

 _She really does give a shit, you know,_ said a wry voice in his mind, and he chuckled at how much more fluid Styx’s voice was down here, so far away from the surface.

And then shouting and chaos, and in its confusion Styx rushed to attack--

Then time stopped.

~*~

“For fuck’s sake,” snapped Yoz, “did you _have_ to go off like that? Like I haven’t had enough to do this evening.”

“sorry.”

“sorry.”

“And have you finished with my acolyte? I’d like him back now, please.”

“of course.”

The faces popped up and dropped back, all of them anxious; Kai was sure he’d had prettier awakenings than staring straight into the armoured heads and many-faceted eyes of a thousand anxious centipedes, but few so welcome.

“well? well?”

“are you. how do you.”

“feel?”

“I’m OK, Styx, thanks,” he said, and coughed. It was unintentional, he was sure, but damn - Styx sure did stink. Yoz patted him on the back, and grinned; she looked tired, and Kai resisted the urge to nag her into taking some shine. He felt as though he needed every flicker of it himself, right now.

Styx already looked stronger, and when Yoz held out her hand a large centipede jumped to it, the flow of its many limbs graceful as it twined around her arm.

“we. go.”

“go.now. can.”

“say goodbye?”

“dirk. brave dirk.”

“eat the. eat. the boy.”

“Yes you can and no you can’t. Stop bullying the poor kid.”

The sound of the centipedes - and if he hadn’t known better he would have said they were frolicking - as they raced around the floor in their never ending fluid motion was as close to laughter as made no odds.

“tasty.”

“young!”

“I’m sure. But wouldn’t you like to get your own back on the one who sent you here?”

The phenomenon froze, just for a split second; every creature stared hard at Yoz, and she grinned when the movement began again. No gentle fluid surge this time but a raging torrent, the anger of Styx obvious from its very motion. Yoz rummaged in her pockets.

“You can track from a scent, right? I reckon it’s about a mile or so north of here - I expect you can get straight there underground.”

She scattered a handful of dirt on the ground, and the Styx closed over it. Every grain of it, every molecule tasted and rolled through the wicked barbed jaws, passed and passed again until every hard-shelled element of it had the scent of its enemy. For forcing it to the surface, interrupting its task and causing it pain it would repay it, a thousandfold.

“I’m going to start things up again,” said Yoz, and eyed Andi’s frozen look of horror with a laugh. “And don’t kill anyone!”

“cross. my.”

“hearts.”

“hope. to starve.”

“Well. I hope you don’t. Ready?”

Kai found himself nodding along with the affirmative bounce from the surrounding swirl of centipedes, and Yoz snapped her fingers.

~*~

“--is going on here?” yelled Andi, and bounded back when a large, much be-spiked centipede pounced at his foot.

“I’ll explain later,” called Yoz, and staggered through the swirl to throw an arm round Dirk’s waist. Styx reared itself up, formed a basically humanoid shape and bowed; then it straightened, and a very large centipede shot out from what would have been the head of the shape, and nuzzled Dirk on one cheek. He held his ground, although his eyes did water a little; then it tapped his lips with its own jaws, snapped them twice in front of his now very pale face, and dropped back to the floor.

“goodbye. goodbye.”

“farewell.”

A swirl extended out to Eero, formed a face, and winked. “next time. boy.”

“next. time. goodbye.”

And then they withdrew, the scarlet tide flowing back down the corridor and into the green room, no doubt to slither down into the sewers to follow the scent Yoz had given them and wreak bloody vengeance on their tormentor.

More than one huge sigh of relief was to be heard once the last one was gone, and Yoz gave Dirk a quick poke in the side. 

“See? I told you that you don’t need me.”

~*~

A promise extracted to explain fully at the party, Kai, Dirk and Henjo shooed onstage to do their thing with Helloween, and Yoz told the Edguys, Dan and Eero that she had to nip off for a few minutes. They protested, and she laughed at them; they’d overcome one of the greatest monsters of magic, survived an encounter with the fabled Styx - what else could hurt them?

Even Eero had to admit that Styx was about as bad it could get, and she shot him a wink.

The energy that rolled off the excited crowd was enormous, and the waves of enthusiasm pounded through the walls and washed over anyone in their path; Yoz was able to skim off enough to pop off to north London and back without anyone getting so much as a nosebleed from her interference.

She dropped out of the air into the dirty chill of Vega’s final lair. She’d taken the time to find a spot a little away from the centre of it; the last thing she wanted to do was drop in on Styx while it was still in the middle of a feeding frenzy; do that, and she wouldn’t even have time to squeak before it ate her too.

Although she was sure it would be very apologetic afterwards.

Darker shapes thumped and rustled in the middle distance, and she called out softly as she approached. Never startle something that can eat you by accident, that was her motto.

“Styx? You done yet?”

A scamper in the dirt, and a face made of spiked legs and the jewelled curve of armoured backs made a face on the pillar at her shoulder.

“yes. yes.”

“all.”

“done.”

“lots here. food.”

“food good. lots of food. dark too.”

“You get her?”

“ate. all here. all here now Styx.”

“So we got her, then. No more Vega.”

A large centipede tapped its hard jaws on her boot, then snapped them together in a series of derisive clicks.

“be careful. careful, magus.”

“humans.”

“never be sure. can always catch. you out.”

“beware.”

“Maybe you shouldn’t have eaten all the evidence, then.”

From the corner of her eye she could see a stream of shadows that headed for a manhole cover, Styx preparing to begin its long journey below. Just enough of the deadly creatures remained to make a sketch of a face on the pillar, and the voice was little more than a whisper.

“farewell!”

“caution.”

“be careful, magus....”

Something pinched her backside and she shot to her feet with a yelp; the last of the centipedes dashed away, only pausing long enough to wiggle its antennae at her cheekily. She shook her fist in mock anger, and it scampered away to join the rest. 

“always be careful....”

Yoz watched until the last movement had vanished, then turned and wandered the desolation under the bellowing concrete roadways for a while. Nothing remained; any rubbish that Styx could convert into fuel for its multifarious body had been shredded and eaten, not even bones left of the derelicts that had attended the sorceress here. And any rats, mice, feral cats, insects or anything else unfortunate to find itself at the business end of Styx’ jaws was gone too, leaving nothing of itself behind that even the most expert forensic scientist could make sense of. Grass and weeds, cardboard, moss - all cleared, and the Magus kicked her heels through the cold dust and smiled at the rusty tin cans and shredded plastic bags that littered the empty space. Styx had done a good job.

Vega must be dead. Dead and gone and there was an end of it, no matter what the centipedes had warned her of, there at the end; it was just being overcautious, she was sure of it.

Time to party, and then time to say goodbye.

Yoz vanished into thin air, and all that was left behind was the thin wail of the wind, the steady growl of traffic, and a faint smell of vinegar.

__

~~tbc~~


	23. Twenty Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "And they always, always collect. Eventually. So I would keep one eye out for them at all times, if I were you," he finished, then turned away. "Miserable city. Miserable weather," he grouched, and in moments he was gone.

_****_

Chapter Twenty-Two

As the rest of the world measured it, it would be midmorning.

As those who had partied until almost dawn would have it, the hour was far earlier than that. Four past hangover, perhaps.

Yoz and Dirk had slunk away early, leaving their friends to drive the hotel staff up the wall with their misbehaviour; it was one heck of an end-of-tour party, and friends had dropped in from all over London to make the most of it. Add to that a good scattering of fans and the relief that they’d all got out of the various dangers alive, and there was an awful lot of nervous energy being blown off down in the bar.

The escapees certainly hadn’t hidden up here to sleep. 

She’d been gentle, accepted Dirk’s frantic lovemaking with a smile; she’d kissed away the desperate tears, and tried to soothe him with her body. When he’d passed out with exhaustion she’d curled around him, murmured words that let him rest then dozed for a few hours herself, calmed the call of the road and her eagerness to be underway once more with the promise that she’d be gone soon. 

A shower was a necessity, however, and when he’d hit a deep enough plane of unconsciousness that she hoped he wouldn’t wake she’d slipped away to take one; she should have known that his Beast was on watch, though, because she’d barely got the water started when he joined her.

They didn’t speak; there was no point. Everything that could be said had been, all the arguments and discussions had run their course and there was just the here and now, the slide of skin under warm water, fingers that caressed, hearts that ached.

He nuzzled along her neck, soft lips kissed their way along to her shoulder, his hair flowing with the water down over her. His body leaned into her back, his hands stroked across the patterns of her belly, her flanks, her breasts, the ink itself moving under his touch as though it wished to say its own farewell.

They took their time, solemnly washed each other in a ritual as graceful as any formal ceremony. And then he held her, rested his cheek atop her head and closed his eyes; he didn’t want to look into that mismatched gaze and see his pain reflected, or watch acceptance, or even - and this would be so much worse - see nothing but the eagerness to be off again, alone, leaving him behind and with never so much as a single wish to come back.

But even in the best hotels the hot water has to run out sometime, and all too soon their quiet reverie had to come to an end. She helped him towel off his long fall of hair, chuckled at how it curled into waves with the wet; he tugged on a blue streak amongst the sopping black, and couldn’t look her in the eye.

Then she got dressed, hoisted the horrible backpack onto her shoulder and stamped her feet into her desperately unladylike boots. He crawled back into bed, leaned against the headboard; the quilt pooled around his waist in still-damp folds of cream linen and he found his cigarettes, lit one.

Yoz sighed, and went to perch on the edge of the bed. Dirk smoked his cigarette, and still couldn’t look her in the eye.

“I have to go,” she said quietly. “All good things must come to an end. And it’s the start of a new year - don’t look at me like that,” she laughed when he opened his mouth to protest, “never mind the human dates. It’s the solstice, the year has turned - your Beast can feel it, can’t he?”

He nodded, although he still looked miserable. She leaned across and kissed him, gently, taking her time; he kissed her back, and they tried to say everything that words could not in that last, brief contact.

Then she touched his cheek with a smile, hopped off the bed and crossed the room, opened the door - all without looking back; he devoured her with his eyes, willed her with all his heart to turn around, crawl back into bed with him, never leave.

She rocked back on her heels when she pulled the door open, and the mismatched eyes widened in surprise.

“ _Vega?_ But you’re--”

The shot roared in the confined space, and the Magus didn’t even have time to scream.

~*~

No matter how shocked - and, yes, frightened, because that gunshot had been loud and he could smell cordite and blood - Dirk’s human mind was, his Beast didn’t so much as blink. By the time he left the bed he was in werewolf form, and Vega just had time to lift the shotgun before he was on her. Part of his mind noticed - as he hurdled the prone form of Yoz - that she wasn’t screaming, and there was a hell of a lot of blood; then the second barrel went off, and the shot ripped into his side. 

He didn’t flinch. He didn’t stop.

Vega had either got sloppy or been rushed because the pellets were of lead, not silver, and so his changed body healed itself in their wake, pushed the pellets out through the grey-silver of his coat with barely a pause. He tore into the woman, Beast in charge, slaughtered her there in the corridor of the hotel as though she were no more than a sheep. She wouldn’t escape this time, not when he made sure to scatter what remained of her across several metres of sober brown carpet. Despite the exhaustion of his colleagues he could hear shouts coming from the rooms around him, familiar voices roused by the commotion, the gunshots and the screams and howls; all fifteen of them were on the same corridor, so at least there wouldn’t be any strangers stumbling into this chaos for a while.

He stopped, breathing hard, and glared at the mess he’d made. Well, that was going to be amusing to explain, but right now he had bigger things on his mind.

Yoz.

When he reached her he was human again, and the sound that crept past his lips was a moan. She had to be dying; the first barrel had taken her in the stomach at point blank range, torn her open almost to the spine. She lay there, her breath coming in high, short gasps, eyes wide with disbelief. Her hands fluttered around the sides of the huge wound, as though she wanted to press them somewhere to stop the bleeding but had no idea where to start.

“Shit. Dirk. Shit,” she gasped, and he could see fear in her eyes, feel it roll off her in waves. She wasn’t just afraid, she was terrified - and he knew then that there wasn’t going to be anything he could do to save her.

“Vega was supposed to be dead!” he burst out, and she bared her teeth at him.

“Bitch. Styx tried,” a gasp, a wince, a fresh burst of blood to soak into the carpet, “to warn me.”

The smell of soap and shampoo warred with the darker stench of blood, the heat of it bringing a rush of saliva to his mouth. Yoz gasped.

“Didn’t listen,” she hissed.

She’d tried to crawl away, elbows and heels skidding in her own blood that now spread around her in a hot tide of crimson; even she could panic in certain situations, it seemed. “Dirk. Help me,” she gasped, her breath whistling high and fast in her throat, her soul stark in her eyes for him to see, “I don’t want to die.”

He lifted her, cradled her head and shoulders in his arms. “Hold on Yoz,” he said, and fought down the panic that attempted to overwhelm his system. Blood-wet hands scrabbled at his skin where she tried to hold on to him, pull herself into his arms, but there was no strength there. Her blood was warm where it pooled around his knees, and he screamed for Kai with everything he had; surely if he could get here then he could use his shine to heal her, couldn’t he?

A curse from the corridor and he shrieked again, fully aware that the gasps from his arms were getting shorter, thinner.

Kai pulled up in the doorway, and swore in German.

“Never mind that, _get in here and help!_ ”

In a flash Kai was there on his knees at their side, touching her shoulder, trying to pour his power into her; she grasped his hand, squeezed it and gave her head a quick shake.

“Don’t, Kai. Can’t. Can’t focus. _Hurts!_ ”

“You have to try,” he said, and his voice was thick now, too. She tried to snort, the sound a bare ghost between gasps.

“Sorry.”

“Please, try!”

“You need to. Do it.”

“I don’t know how!”

“Shit. _Shit_.”

“Don’t do this, Yoz,” Dirk begged. The blood he knelt in was cooling, the thick coppery smell of it all around him now. His Beast howled inside him for misery; his mate was dying in his arms, and there was nothing at all he could do about it.

Except bear witness.

“Shit, Dirk. Hurts. _Hurts_. Not supposed. To end like this.”

“Hush now,” he crooned, and stroked a blood-streaked hand through her hair. She was pale, lips blue, her eyes losing focus; they would track away to nothing then jerk back to his face, the terror in them going straight to his heart. The room was filling with people, but as far as he was concerned they could have been alone; he could feel the gasps for breath getting fainter, shallower. Her heartbeat was erratic, weak; he could barely feel it against his skin now, and even her breath was turning cold.

“I lo--” he began, but she managed to touch his lips with her fingers. They were cold, damp with her own blood; he could taste it on his lips when her hand fell back to her side with a thump.

She forced a quick smile. “Don’t,” she gasped, then twitched in his arms; she convulsed once more, the thin wisps of breath caught in her throat - then she went slack, and the mismatched eyes lost their focus for the very last time.

“Oh God,” someone moaned, and it might even have been him.

She was human enough to die, after all.

~*~

He lost track of how long he knelt there in her blood, her corpse cradled in his arms. 

“The universe grieves with you in your hour of greatest need, but it is imperative for the safety of the soul of the Balanced One that you give her to me,” said a voice, and the inflection could only come from one species. Dirk blinked tears from his eyes, and looked up; Valdrin crouched next to him, his arms extended.

He wanted to take her away, and his Beast snarled.

“You can’t have her,” he said, so softly he wasn’t sure that the Weaver would hear him.

Kai had backed away from them, and propped himself against the wall; he could feel blood on his hands, knew it had soaked into the hotel robe that was all he’d had time to fling on when he heard Dirk’s shrieks outside his room. He wanted to push his hair out of his eyes, but couldn’t bear the thought of touching himself while her gore still clotted on his fingers. He hadn’t seen the Weavers arrive, but now he took the time to look there were four of them; Valdrin he recognised from the attack on the asylum in Madrid, and the other three he’d met before, at the Rosicrucian headquarters in Turin before the war.

At least they’d sent their most senior, he thought, and pushed himself away from the wall with a twist of his shoulders. 

“Dumitru,” he said, and the oldest of the four glanced across at him and tilted his head in acknowledgement. “Why--” he paused, licked his lips. Dirk still cradled the body of the Magus close to his chest, and ignored the Weaver’s quiet imploring to hand her to him. “Why does he want her?”

The Weaver took a deep breath. “Time is short. One comes for her soul and we can keep it safe,” he snapped out. Henjo, who’d wormed his way into the room and was trying to get to Dirk, stopped short and stared.

“Did he just speak normally?”

Kai shrugged. “They can if they have to,” he said, then went to one knee in the congealing mass around his devastated friend. What he didn’t have time to explain was that it was physically painful for a Weaver to force itself to truncate its words like that; the desperation this one must be feeling to do so convinced him to get down in the filthy mess on the floor and try to talk to Dirk.

Voices filled the air with meaningless babble; Andi’s furious roar over being awoken became yelps of horror when he ran out of his room and straight into what was left of the sorceress, in bare feet no less, but Weiki’s hushed voice soon soothed him to quieter complaints.

“You have to hand her over,” Kai said, and felt fear pinch at his sides when Dirk shook his head, his hair falling across his face and into hers. “Dirk, I understand, I really do. But you have to give her up.”

His mind went back to another room, another dead woman, another assault of the stench of death. This time it wasn’t his lover, and he could afford to be brutal. He firmed his resolve, and this time when he spoke his voice was brisk, matter of fact.

“If you don’t do it she’ll go to Hell and suffer for ever and it’ll be your fault. You want that?”

If he never managed to forgive himself for the agony in his friend’s eyes it would be too soon. Henjo, crouched behind him, made a noise in his throat; yes, it had been a horrible thing to say, but he had to get Dirk moving. And quick; the air was growing heavier, thicker, and from the way the Weavers fidgeted their time was definitely running out. He didn’t know who - precisely - was coming, but he was ready to bet that it wasn’t the fucking tooth fairy.

“We will treat the Balanced One with all the gentleness and respect we would show one of our own that has departed for the endless weave beyond time,” said Valdrin softly.

Dirk straightened, closed his eyes, breathed once, twice. Deep, from the diaphragm, letting the air hiss from between blood-marked lips until he’d got some semblance of control back. Then he kissed her on the forehead, and passed her to Valdrin.

“Take care of her,” he said, his voice tangled in his throat.

The Weaver scooped her up, rose to his feet; Henjo and Kai got Dirk up, and Dan - clad in nothing but boxers and face rather a sick green from the sight of all the blood - slung a hotel robe around his shoulders, and between the three of them they managed to get him wearing it. Dirk was no help, just stared at the body in Valdrin’s arms; he kept expecting the dull eyes to blink, a smile to break across those silent features, or perhaps a grimace and a curse to explode from between lips blued with death.

“What’s happening?” asked a voice high with panic; Eggi, and Felix pulled him away from the destruction before he freaked out completely and set them all off.

Fear jumped from one man to the next like lightning. The atmosphere that was already thickened with death and terror was now alive with it; it pushed sharp fingers into mouths and throats to choke with the knowledge of their own mortality, the awful perception that at any moment the spread obscenity of violent death could come to any of them. 

“Why is it getting so dark?” asked Sascha, and Markus, wide eyed, shook his head.

“He comes,” whispered Dumitru, and time stopped.

~*~

He arrived without fanfare into the chaos, a tall and elegant figure that stood and watched from a little further down the corridor. He took in the shock on the faces, the expressions of disgust as they tried to avoid putting bare feet into pools of the filth that the wolf had scattered so widely in his vengeful attack. He read the emotions, the shock of seeing men they knew drenched in blood, the form of the Magus - the irrepressible, noisy, infuriating Magus - so still in the arms of a creature she’d been vehement in her dislike of.

And He smiled.

They gave ground before Him at his approach. He caught thoughts that flickered of fear, then of relief; after all, He looked like someone in charge until they got a really good look at Him, and cold terror snapped back into their thundering hearts. Some were quicker on the uptake than others, as was always the case; the tattooed one and the tall thin one by his side got it fastest, He thought, and He spared them both a gracious nod when they crossed themselves. 

The shapeshifters drew back, dropped their gazes, fell to a crouch and grovelled in the muck; their altered nature was being assaulted by His presence, He knew, and He was not displeased.

He paused in the doorway, and smiled.

“My Lord,” said the dark Weaver, its pain at the short speech all too clear to His eyes. “You are too late. She is ours.”

~*~

Kai, Henjo and Dan clung to Dirk, their tight clasp as much to support each other as him; they had a pretty good idea who it was that stood in a calm parade rest in the doorway; the power that emanated from Him was unmistakable, and was enough to flatten them all. In His tailored suit, His hair pulled back into a neat tail down his back, it was easy to see why He had been described as the most beautiful of the angels before He fell. He was perfect, His form balanced, not too heavy, not too slim, but built as though He were the proof against which every one of them would be measured - and found wanting.

“Lucifer,” said Dirk, and the Fallen One smiled.

“Mr. Schlächter,” he replied politely, and His voice was cool and beautiful to hear. “I am sorry for your loss. But she has been mine for many years now, and I wish to collect.”

“The universe that is the Mother of us all rejects your claim,” said Valdrin firmly. “She is part of our weave now, and will remain so until the end of time itself.”

“No,” said Lucifer, and the first flickers of anger could be seen in those glorious eyes.

Kai could hear Markus outside the room. It sounded as though he was praying, and he wasn’t the only one. Lucifer flipped a hand at the noise, irritated, and it cut off with a choke.

Dumitru stepped forward, the nictitating membranes flicking across his huge wet eyes in agitation. “They are not yours today, my Lord,” he said, and with a snort Lucifer tilted his head. Gasps came from outside, the sound of breathing resumed; Kai gritted his teeth, and resolved even more firmly not to panic. This one was a bully, but he’d be damned if he could think of anything useful to do about it.

“Even you cannot deny that she awarded her soul to me of her own free will,” persisted the fallen angel, and Dumitru bowed again.

“And in Your turn,” he replied smoothly, “You cannot deny that You broke the rules.”

“Pshaw,” grumbled the Fallen One, “rules.”

“Those rules are in place for Your own protection as well as for that of every creature within this plane. Were You and Your adversary allowed to touch this realm of existence direct then it would become a battlefield, and their existence would be meaningless.”

Kai couldn’t believe his ears. Dumitru was _scolding_ the Lord of the Fallen, Lucifer himself?

“Their existence, many would argue, is meaningless anyway. Give Me the Magus.”

“You broke the rules, and Your claim is forfeit. No.”

“Wait, wait,” said a voice, and Kai could feel the bones in his neck creak when he turned to glare at Dan. _Daniel, shut up!_ “What do you mean, ‘broke the rules’? What rules?”

Lucifer cocked his head. “Did she not teach you, little man?” He asked, and His voice was smooth and hypnotic, a slow haunt of beauty. “Myself and My... adversary, as the creature there so delicately put it, are not allowed to affect the workings of this shoddy plane of existence directly. It claims that I did so, and thus My claim to the woman’s soul is void; however, it lies.”

How Dan was still on his feet under that stare Kai had no idea. Perhaps it was the desperate clutch of Dirk’s hand in his own that was doing it. 

Dan tilted his chin, green eyes like agates.

“And You never do, of course,” he said, and for a moment Lucifer looked quite taken aback.

Then He turned away and laughed, and the group of four men staggered under the weight of Dan’s sudden slump. The bravado had apparently taken rather more out of him than had at first been evident.

“The Lord of the Fallen,” said Dumitru quietly, “touched the sorceress with His own hands. The Magus--”

“Wove her magic well, yes, we know,” snapped Lucifer, then shrugged and opened His arms, his smile as bright and innocent as that of a babe. “And when the sorceress’ plea to have the spell lifted reached My ears, what could I do? To watch the dance she led the Magus has been the most entertainment I have had in many a long, grey millennia.”

“Then take Your entertainment,” snapped the Weaver, who was beginning to sweat, “and go.”

Lucifer cocked His head, the handsome face marked with compassion. “It pains you, Weaver?”

He bared his teeth at the elegance of the speaker, but remained silent.

“Then I shall take this one,” and He gestured at the remains of Vega, spread along the corridor, “and go. But remember this, wide-eyed one; I shall watch. And I shall watch, and the first moment you take your hands from her, she will be _mine_.”

He hovered one hand over the mess outside, then snapped His fingers as though he remembered something. 

“Of course,” He murmured, then turned to face Dirk. “Glasya-Lebolas sends his greetings,” He said, and Kai felt Dirk shudder. That was the name of the demon that had inhabited Dirk, that had possessed him and forced him to perform such atrocities that Yoz had to remove the memories from him before they drove him insane, “and he looks forward to renewing your acquaintance.”

“That isn’t going to happen,” said Kai firmly, and a part of his mind squeaked and gibbered in panic when Lucifer turned His eyes to him and stared, a pretty little smile curving His perfect lips.

“Never say never, little man,” He said, and winked.

Then He snapped his fingers again, and the shattered remains of the sorceress began to twitch. They shook and danced, then started to coalesce; they pulled themselves from the ruined carpet with the wet, sucking sounds of clotted blood pulled away in strings from its attachment, and set about reassembling into an awful parody of life. Smashed bone ground together, ripped flesh clung to torn ligament, and then the ruined form of Vega stood before her Lord. Her eyes were lost, and her expression - what could be seen of it through the horrible damage the wolf had inflicted - was as bewildered as that of a lost child.

“Come, little one,” He said, “we have amusements awaiting.”

He raised his hand, but Dumitru wasn’t finished.

“Wait,” he said, and now Lucifer was visibly annoyed.

“ _What?_ ” He snapped, and every man present trembled under the force of his anger. “Will you bait Me further?”

“An exchange,” said the Weaver, and Kai could see the strain was telling on him; scarlet threads of burst vessels laced his eyes, and a slow creep of blood made its way down his neck from his ear. “One who is already in Your custody.”

“For what?”

“This,” said the Weaver, and held up - a stuffed toy.

Dirk let out a sound that was somewhere between a laugh and a sob, and Kai blinked. Henjo, however, still fixated in horror on the tall and gruesome form of the dead sorceress, saw her flinch.

“Kai!” he hissed, “look at Vega!”

She was beginning to moan, a bubble of sound that retched through her torn throat, almost-words that begged for her Lord not to take the thing she was so afraid of. Lucifer eyed the bear, and then it opened its eyes and stared at His new servant with undisguised hate.

“Ah,” said the Fallen One, then shrugged. “I am aware of the one which you refer to. Very well, it shall be done. Now, let Me see....”

Vega had fallen to her ruined knees, the bones of her fingers patting at the perfect cut of His trousers; He made a brief gesture, and a coil of gut shot from her own midsection and inserted itself between her teeth, looped over her shoulders like the reins of a horse.

“Come,” He said, and the bear hopped down from Dumitru’s hands and bowed to the Fallen One, allowed itself to be picked up and placed on her bleeding back like a jockey. He touched its face, and a mouth was created; the bear smiled, and its voice was rough when it spoke.

“My Lord,” it said.

Lucifer snapped His fingers, and produced a small whip from thin air; He handed it to the bear, and it applied it with some vigour to its mount, who wailed and gagged around the stretch of her own gut that tugged at the corners of her devastated mouth.

“Come,” He said once more, and followed by the pathetic form of the dead sorceress and her own personal demon, He turned and walked away.

~*~

The light was back.

Kai blinked, and realised three things at once; one, he was lying in his back in something wet. Two, he had apparently passed out when Lucifer had left.

Three, he was going to be sick.

Voices blathered around him, meaningless in their anxiety; he rolled to his knees and retched, nothing but bile to scorch his throat and add another miasma to the thick stench that filled the room. Someone helped him up, and he realised that it was Andi, his friend’s face grey with shock.

Now he was upright his head cleared a bit. Henjo was perched on the end of the bed with one arm around Dirk, who had his head in his hands; clots of blood hung in his hair, and the thought did cross Kai’s mind that explaining all of this to the hotel staff was going to be rather difficult.

Dumitru leaned on another Weaver, eyes closed. Valdrin remained in the centre of the room, and he still cradled the dead Magus against his chest. He murmured to one of his colleagues, and it came forward and rummaged in one of Yoz’ jacket pockets; when the hand emerged holding the marble that Kai recognised as containing the pocket universe that held her room he was about to protest, but when he tried to move he staggered. Andi caught him, held him up; Valdrin closed one eyelid in a long, slow wink, and he held his tongue.

“Henjo,” said the Weaver softly, and shot out the tip of his tongue to moisten his lips. “The Balanced One contacted the guardians of the Eternal Weave some time ago, and left in our care certain instructions as to the disposal of her belongings should this dreadful eventuality occur, which she knew that in the fullness of our mother universe’s time that it would. And she wanted you to have the only thing that she ever truly owned, in the sure and certain knowledge that you and it could form an unbreakable bond--” he sighed, seeming tired of his own voice, and nodded to the other Weaver. It took Henjo’s hand, placed the marble in his palm, and closed his fingers over it.

“Take great care of it,” whispered the Weaver, and then he turned to Kai. “The only instruction she left for the Shining One was to take care of the grieving wolf,” he said, and Kai nodded solemnly. That he could do, yes. They all would.

And then it turned to go.

“Wait!” yelped someone, and a small figure wormed its way to the front of the crowd, shaking each foot like the cat he was after he’d lifted it from the clinging muck that covered the carpet. Tobi. “What about all this - mess?” he said. “How the Hell are we going to explain it?”

Valdrin cocked an eyebrow in surprise at Kai, who shrugged and returned a rather wan smile. The Weaver shook his head, and turned back to eye the smaller man severely.

“Return at once to your assigned spaces within this establishment. Clean your bodies. When you emerge, the physicality of the events will have vanished. Now go,” he said, and at that final single syllable every man began to walk away, Andi taking the time to prop Kai against the wall before he, too, went back to his room without once looking back.

Now that there was some space, Eero - the only one not in the room unaffected by the Weavers words, it seemed - sneaked in, and wormed his way under Dan’s arm. They were all that remained; the Rays, the Weavers, and Yoz.

Henjo shook Dirk’s arm gently, and he took his hands away from his face and stared at Valdrin. The Weaver nodded, and with the help of his friends he approached the stiffening body in the Weaver’s arms. He closed her eyes, and planted one last gentle kiss on her forehead.

“Goodbye,” he said.

Then he let Kai take him in his arms, and wept.

~*~

_Two weeks later_   


Markus liked to walk home.

Some parts of Hamburg had a decidedly unsavoury reputation, but when you were six foot five and looked the way he did you were, usually, left well alone. So it was pleasant - even if, as now, the air was filled with a cold rain that soaked his curls to frizz - to walk the streets late at night; it cleared his head, gave him time to think about things.

And there was plenty to think about.

How they’d got Dirk on the plane to come home was some kind of miracle. He’d been catatonic with grief, and it had taken every ounce of cajoling, pleading and - in the end - brute force that his friends possessed to get him moving again. Since then, either Kai or Henjo had been with him every minute of the day, Henjo taking the small amount of time he wasn’t watching over Dirk to build a relationship of his own with her room.

He’d said that it grieved too, and Markus marvelled over the thought that a construction of stone could feel anything at all.

Dan had travelled to Finland with Eero; the revelation that even for the likes of Yoz life was too damn short had spurred him to action, and the pair were now, as far as that was possible, Official. They were still trying to work out where they would live and how they would deal with their busy individual schedules, but they were determined to make the most of whatever time they had left. You didn’t face down a Fallen Angel and not have thoughts about your own mortality, after all.

Kai would be driving Dirk down to Fulda for the next full moon; Dani would be going with them, the three ‘shifters unwilling to let the newest member of their odd little clan face the change alone. He’d even managed to get a tiny smile out of Dirk by saying that if any of the bigger predators thought that they could hunt him, he’d be showing them that the big chisel teeth of his Beast weren’t just good for gnawing into people’s houses.

“You really should pay more attention to your surroundings,” said a smooth, amused voice behind him, “I’ve been following you for an hour now, and I’m getting very bored.”

Markus whirled around. He knew that voice.

_Vampire!_

“Oh, don’t go all victim on me,” grumbled James, and pulled the collar of his tailored greatcoat up around his neck. “This is a foul city you live in, are you aware of that?”

“It suits me,” snapped Markus. “What do you want?”

The vampire rolled his eyes.

“I travel across bloody Europe in a box,” he said with a melodramatic sigh, “freeze my undead arse off looking for you when I would much rather be hunting, and what do I get? Sullenness.”

“What. Do. You. Want?”

James was suddenly all business. “I have a message for you,” he said. “From the Weavers, curse their bulging eyes. Before Yoz died, you asked her to do something for you.”

Markus looked at his feet. He’d hoped she hadn’t said anything to anyone about that.

“Yes, well,” James continued, and felt rather sorry for the big man. “She left a rather precise set of instructions for the Weavers, you see. And they carried them out and, well, since I owed them one for helping to get me out of that horrible cage--” and now Markus was lost, but he figured if he kept listening the vampire would get to the point _eventually_ , “they sent me to tell you.” He cocked his head, waited for the sleepy blue-green of the human’s eyes to find his own. “’He is free’, they said.”

“Oh my God,” muttered Markus as the implications of the words sank in.

“That’s what the business of the bear was all about back in the hotel, apparently.”

Markus just blinked.

“You’re welcome,” said the vampire with a shrug, and turned to go. The other man touched his arm, and he turned back with a raised eyebrow.

“She’s really dead?” he asked softly, and James smiled.

“With humans, you never can tell,” he said. “And as for Weavers, well, they’re even harder to figure out. But there’s a couple of things you might want to remember, Markus Grosskopf; one, she hated the Weavers for a reason. And they didn’t keep her from Hell just out of the goodness of their hearts, so they must be up to something. Two, you now owe them a favour too.”

James pulled his collar a little tighter, and shrugged. “And they always, always collect. Eventually. So I would keep one eye out for them at all times, if I were you,” he finished, then turned away. “Miserable city. Miserable weather,” he grouched, and in moments he was gone.

Markus stared at the empty, rain-wet street, and shivered.

__

~~Fin~~


End file.
